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Jun 07, 2018
There are several easy IP spoofing tools out on the Internet today that can help you temporarily modify your IP address. Though, please make sure to do your due diligence and research any tool that you want to use to make sure that it’s trustworthy (like we have with the services listed here). Jun 25, 2020 · DNS spoofing is a cyber-attack in which fake data is introduced into the DNS resolver’s cache, which causes the name server to return an incorrect IP address. In other words, these types of attacks exploit vulnerabilities in domain name servers and redirect traffic towards illegitimate websites. Sender Policy Framework (SPF) was designed to stop email spoofing or sender address forgery, not IP (Internet Protocol) spoofing. IP spoofing forges, or "spoofs," the source address in the header IP Spoofing Where email spoofing centers on the user, IP spoofing is primarily aimed at a network. IP spoofing involves an attacker trying to gain unauthorized access to a system by sending messages with a fake or "spoofed" IP address to make it look like the message came from a trusted source, such as one on the same internal computer network IP Spoofing Attackers may use IP (Internet Protocol) spoofing to disguise a computer IP address, thereby hiding the identity of the sender or impersonating another computer system. One purpose of IP address spoofing is to gain access to a networks that authenticate users based on IP addresses. Spammers have been spoofing email addresses for a long time. Years ago, they used to get contact lists from malware-infected PCs. Today's data thieves choose their targets carefully, and phish Aug 11, 2017 · IP spoofing. This is a more technical version spoofing, one that seeks to impersonate your device, rather than your personal credentials. It is an important component in many types of cyber attacks. Gaining access to a computer network. IP spoofing is often used against computer networks, where accounts aren’t the primary login method.
Jul 16, 2020 · If all else fails, Google Chrome has access to your computer’s IP address. An IP address or Internet Protocol Address is a numerical label that is assigned to every device on a computer network. In simple terms, it is more like a postal address, but with long binary numbers.
Spoofing is when a caller deliberately falsifies the information transmitted to your caller ID display to disguise their identity. Scammers often use neighbor spoofing so it appears that an incoming call is coming from a local number, or spoof a number from a company or a government agency that you may already know and trust. How to Change Your Location in Chrome & Firefox (spoof Aug 21, 2018 How To Spoof IP Address & How To Proxy Your IP Geo-Location
Oct 18, 2013
How to Change Your Location in Chrome & Firefox (spoof Aug 21, 2018 |
Chirp acts as a transport layer and is capable of carrying any type of data, including encrypted payloads. This is comparable to Wi-Fi, which is not encrypted natively, but can straightforwardly be used to carry secure HTTP web connections.
For secure interactions, we recommend using Chirp to transmit information encrypted with industry-standard AES-256 or RSA cryptography. Please get in touch to arrange a demo.
When using Chirp for access control or authentication, we recommend using one-time or time-limited keys which are discarded after use (or after an expiry period). This protects against "replay" attacks, in which an attacker records a Chirp to play back later.
An example of a Chirp with TOTP (Time-based One Time Passwords) can be seen here. |
Markov Chain Based Efficient Defense Against Adversarial Examples in Computer Vision
Adversarial examples are the inputs to machine learning models that result in erroneous outputs, which are usually generated from normal inputs via subtle modification and seem to remain unchanged to human observers. They have severely threatened the applications of machine learning, especially in the areas with high-security requirements. Unfortunately, for this issue, there is neither unambiguous interpretation about the causes nor almighty defenses in spite of the increasing attention and discussions. Based on the distinguished statistical feature of Markov chain, an effective defense method is proposed in this paper by exploring the differences in the probability distributions of adjacent pixels between normal images and adversarial examples. Specifically, the concept of overall probability value (OPV) is defined to estimate the modification to an input, which can be used to preliminarily determine whether the input is an adversarial example or not. Furthermore, by calculating the OPV of an input and modifying its pixel value to destroy the potential adversarial characteristics, the proposed method can efficiently purify adversarial examples. A series of experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the defense method. When facing various attacks, it obtains excellent performance with accuracy over 92% for MNIST and 70% for ImageNet.
Zhou, Y; Hu, X; Wang, L; Duan, S; Chen, Y
Volume / Issue
Start / End Page
Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) |
Researchers have identified new cyber-espionage activity focusing on government entities, state-owned aerospace and defense firms, telecom companies, and IT organizations in multiple Asian countries.
The attackers have employed a broad range of legitimate tools in these attacks, including the use of dynamic-link library (DLL) side-loading to deliver the malicious code. They've specifically targeted old and outdated versions of security solutions, graphics software, and web browsers that lack mitigations for DLL side-loading attacks.
One of the other tools deployed by the attackers is a previously unknown information stealer, Logdatter, whose capabilities include keylogging, taking screenshots, connecting to and querying SQL databases, code injection, downloading files, and stealing clipboard data.
These attacks have been underway since early 2021 and are still ongoing. It is unknown precisely who is behind the espionage campaigns, but they have been associated with the "ShadowPad" remote access trojan (RAT).
Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud uses software inventory collection and patch management capabilities to help to keep your protected systems updated, and identifies and blocks malicious payloads with its advanced behavioral detection engine. |
#Infosec17 Attribution Still Remains a Challenge, Say FBI
Speaking in the keynote theatre at Infosecurity North America on “Profiling the Agile Cyber Adversary”, Jeffrey Tricoli, section chief cyber at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), said that trends like IoT Big Data were important, but conventional threats are still common.
Tricoli said that in the early 2000s, the Leaves virus was not one of the better known, but it had an impact as it took advantage of home PCs with the Sub7 infection, and reinfected them.
“This was a big deal and the first time we saw 1000s of computers in a coordinated attack by unknown individuals with unknown intent,” he said. “Put yourself back in early 2000s, robustness is built up now and security providers and defenders didn’t exist and infrastructure was relatively fragile, and there were probably 13 DNS providers, so if you went after one there would be a big impact—so we saw this and it was a big, big deal.”
Tricoli said that Leaves was caused by a 25-year-old British student who was trying to generate revenue and this was the first instance where we saw how to turn viruses from destructive malware, and how to turn to monetize them.
“After that, more attackers realized they could monetize and turn computers into a resource and through our interviews, they are entrepreneurs knowing how to make money and see opportunities to exist and take advantage of them. We see the adversary changing and learning from each other.”
In terms of attribution, Tricoli said that common were: hacktivism, crime, insider, espionage, terrorism and warfare, and typically a first question is “who did this”. Unfortunately this does little for value, as while it does make victims feel good, they should get systems back up.
He concluded by saying that a constant theme is that risk has not risen to the C suite where the discussion needs to happen, and while attribution was not always easy, but this was “not something government can tackle alone”.
Source: Information Security Magazine |
By Habiba Rashid
It is a fact that Gamers are under constant threat of phishing, malware, and ransomware attacks. Let's big into defense options for gamers.
This is a post from HackRead.com Read the original post: How gamers should Secure their accounts from cyber attacks
This post first appeared on This Ransomware Tells Users To Play A Popular Japanese Game, please read the originial post: here |
In recent years, cyber attackers have adopted a new, more surreptitious operational mandate; one that employs a set of strategies and technologies that dramatically complicate the detection process. At the forefront of these rogue like tactics are serving up dynamic IP addresses.
To overcome traditional defenses, attackers commonly use headless browser software, such as PhantomJS or a Selenium WebDriver. They also employ multiple evasion tactics. To avoid triggering size- or rate-limiting thresholds, they split the load between dozens of IP addresses and constantly add new IP addresses. Human-like “behaviors” are incorporated—starting at different landing pages and mimicking human-like timings and patterns of movement. They can be especially difficult to detect when attacks are low rate and low volume and are spread over time and across a large pool of changing IP addresses.
Types of Dynamic IP Attacks:
Dynamic IP attacks come in various shapes and colors, but some of the most common scenarios include:
- HTTP/S flooding: This technique involves full-page reloads of dynamic content, fetching large elements and bypassing cache. Imagine 100 visitors arriving from what appear to be legitimate IP addresses and client headers. The empty browser cache issues a full-page reload that fetches about 50 HTML elements. After a minute, the process repeats with a new group of 100 IP addresses—resulting in 5,000 HTTPS requests per second.
- Password brute-force attempts: These often target HTTP, FTP, SQL, SSH and RDP. For example, 100 simultaneous clients, each with a unique IP, issue one request per second. After a minute, every client returns with a new IP address, generating 100 password attempts per second
- Web scraping/data harvesting by gray marketers: This technique can be used to attack online ticketing systems, enabling attackers to buy and sell tickets at a profit. Launching 500 clients with uniqueIPs, attackers monitor 500 tickets, waiting for a dramatic price drop to make a “bargain” purchase. Everyclient refreshes the pages every 10 seconds. After a minute, each of the 500 clients returns with a new IP— resulting in 500 bots online, each making 50 requests per second.
- Web scraping/data harvesting by competitors: This type of attack is similar to the one described above but is executed to collect competitive pricing and plagiarize content. In this type of dynamic IP attack, 100 clients with unique IPs issue 10 requests per minute, with each client crawling through a different category and clicking on items in random order. After three minutes, each client returns with a new IP. The result is the ability to “scrape” 1,000 items per minute.
- Clickjacking: This attack involves click fraud on a competitor’s pay-per-click (PPC) advertisements. A common scenario: An operator remotely controls 1,000 malware-infected PCs. Every day, the malware generates 1,000 faked clicks on a competitor’s PPC affiliate ads, leading to 30,000 monthly clicks. The competitor must then pay the affiliate regardless of whether or not a purchase is made. At one cent per click, the attack drums up $300 for the affiliate.
Methods of Execution:
Attackers commonly use one of four methods to gain access to a large pool of IP addresses: malware botnets, lists of SOCK proxies, VPN services or cloud services.
Malware Botnets: The notorious botnet created by the Linux XOR. DDOS malware has been responsible for thousands of DDoSattacks and hundreds of thousands of SSH brute-force attempts. The vast majority of targets infected by thismalware are personal home routers or modems, all of which receive dynamic IPs from the respective Internetservice providers.
Another example is the recently discovered LinuxEllipses malware, which infects the Linux host. In a sophisticated technique, it installs an anonymous proxy server that carries out future attacks. This malicious behavior further increases the prevalence of dynamic IT attacks
Lists of SOCK Proxies: A huge number of SOCK proxies lists are floating publicly on various amateur forums. New lists are submitted every day, with numerous offers from sellers of “verified and working” lists. Some sites have transformed this into a business of renting SOCK servers for a specific duration. Various attack scripts and tools can use lists of SOCK proxies to generate traffic over thousands of real clients.
VPN Services: A variety of companies offer virtual private networking (VPN) services—including Hotspot Shield, TunnelBear, Private Internet Access, HideMyAss and CyberGhost, to name just a few. With hundreds of servers spread all over the world, these providers offer a pool of more than 100,000 IP addresses. In mid-2015, the free “Hola VPN” browser extension was used to carry out a DDoS attack against the popular 8chan image board. More than 50 million users around the world use Hola to mask their true locations—bypassing censorship and gaining access to geo-blocked content, such as Netflix andBBC programming.
Cloud Services: Many cloud providers offer a free tier for developers and users who want to run small-sized servers and applications on cloud infrastructures. Such cloud providers are often the target of hackers, who are continually seeking access to more servers and services for launching malicious activity.
In the quest to attract more customers, many cloud providers offer a simple and easy process for creating a new account. This ease of use has a dark side: insufficient security validations that enable hackers to abuse the cloud services and generate massive quantities of fraudulent accounts. Those fraudulent accounts can then be used to launch network attacks.
Existing cloud customers also can be the target of hackers, who welcome opportunities to obtain leaked or stolen API keys. Hackers can then use those keys to programmatically manipulate cloud services, such as Google AppEngine and Amazon Web Services (AWS). When such API keys fall into the wrong hands, they can be abused—as evidenced by a web developer who recently lost a reported $6,500 in just a few hours after his Amazon API keys were accidentally leaked on the public Internet
Defending Against Dynamic IP Attacks: It is not unusual for dynamic IP attacks to be overlooked. After all, these attacks are challenging to defend against and most defense systems are not capable of acting against attacks that so closely resemble real user patterns. Even so, Radware expects focus and attention on these attacks to grow as organizations become more aware of the risks.
If traditional cyber and application protection systems cannot thwart dynamic IP attacks, what can organizations do to protect themselves? The answer lies in advanced defense systems that leverage behavioral-based detection mechanisms. These sophisticated capabilities help in identifying malicious bots, headless browsers and other dynamic IP attacks. Ideally, behavioral-based defense should offer an advanced host fingerprinting mechanism, which goes far beyond IP-based detection to identify—and block—malicious actors in real time. |
Recently 2 of the windows XP boxes on my LAN suddenly stopped sharing folders with my WDTV Live+ (and with each other). The WD would list the machines under Video/Network Shares but couldn’t actually connect with them. However both PCs could see the WD box and work with files on a USB drive connected to the WD. Everything about my network seemed correctly configured (even the Master Browser business) and none of the various fixes I tried worked. Until I found this: http://forums.comodo.com/empty-t14665.0.html. To summarize, look for this registry key: HKEY_Local_Machine>>SYSTEM>CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa: restrictanonymous. If it’s set to 0, sorry I can’t help you. But if it’s set to 1 or 2, modify it to zero and reboot XP. If this doesn’t solve your problem go back into the registry and see what value that key has. Some security software as well as viruses and other nasties will reset that value back to 1 or 2. If that’s the case do a thorough scan of your machine withyou antivirus software as well as other applications such as Malwarebytes and Spybot. This worked for me. |
The malware installs cryptominer and steals AWS credentials
Security researchers from Cado Security have published a new report, detailing the discover of a new botnet that has been active since at least April 2020. Dubbed TeamTNT, the botnet targets Docker installs and spreads malware capable of abusing victims systems to mine Monero cryptocurrency.
While crypto-malware is nothing new, this self-propagating worm is also capable of stealing Amazon Web Services (AWS) credentials in the background and delivering this information directly to cybercriminals' hands. Researchers said that the newly-discovered malware is relatively unique in regards to its functionality of AWS credential theft.
According to Cado Security post, the worm targets various cloud-based platforms, such as Docker or Kubernetes:
The worm also steals local credentials, and scans the internet for misconfigured Docker platforms. We have seen the attackers, who call themselves “TeamTNT”, compromise a number of Docker and Kubernetes systems.
The attackers are now concentrating on these platforms for obvious reasons: many companies and organizations are now storing plenty of sensitive data files online, along with backups of their servers. By stealing AWS credentials, malware authors are provided with access to the most valuable information.
Malicious actors abuse the misconfigured APIs
Leaving a misconfigured management APIs exposed can lead to a disaster, as happened to the data management company Attunity, which exposed sensitive information of its high-profile clients, including Ford and Netflix. Unfortunately, this outcome is not unique, and there are plenty of businesses and organizations that do not manage to protect management APIs from unauthorized access correctly.
The cybercriminal gang TeamTNT, which spreads the data-stealing and crypto-mining worm targets precisely these occurrences – threat actors scan the internet for the vulnerable Docker systems that have the management API not protected by the password. Once inside, threat actors are capable of deploying the malware, as well as running the DDoS attacks.
This type of infection routine is nothing new, has been seen in previous campaigns. Security experts said, however, the worm with this function has never yet been used to steal AWS credentials, however, so TeamTNT attacks are relatively unique at the present time.
The worm attacks AWS, deploys additional malware
TeamTnT not only expanded the platforms that the malware attacks (Kubernetes), but also included a more important functionality within the worm – credential theft of AWS. If the compromised systems are also operating AWS infrastructure, malware scans the ~/.aws/credentials and ~/.aws/config folders, which hold information that is not encrypted. Since the data is exposed in plain text and is not protected, it can be easily read – delivered to the attackers' Command & Control server.
Post-infection, malware delivers the XMRig miner that can mine Monero and deliver the funds to the threat actors' wallets. TeamTnT gang later deploys more malicious tools on the compromised network, including SSH post-exploitation tool “punk.py,” Tsunami IRC backdoor, Diamorphine rootkit, and others. As evident, the attackers are trying to get as many profits from the botnet as possible.
Researchers at Cado Security claimed that they found 119 compromised systems, although they believe that the number of infected Kubernetes Clusters and Jenkins Build Servers. Nonetheless, it is believed that the real number might be much higher, along with the cash that the gang gained so far:
So far we have seen two different Monero wallets associated with these latest attacks, which have earned TeamTNT about 3 XMR. That equates to only about $300 USD, however this is only one of their many campaigns.
Experts also claimed that the TeamTnT has not yet put the stolen AWS credential to use, as the team sent the Canary Tokens to TeamTnT and found that the credentials have not yet been accessed. Although criminals could access this data manually – it would leave no footprint.
Once the attackers put the stolen credentials in use, they can increase their profits even further – install a cryptominer into a more powerful AWS EC2 clusters or sell the information on the underground hacking forums. |
Lately, there have been a few discussions on Hacker News about
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)., In those
discussions, I noticed that several commenters (and blog post authors)
were advocating for the use of
X-Frame-Options as a mitigation
technique., , , Unfortunately,
X-Frame-Options is meant to mitigate a similar type of attack
(clickjacking), it provides no protection whatsoever against CSRF. This
blog post is intended to provide some background resources on CSRF and
clickjacking, as well as explain how
X-Frame-Options fits in as a
So what is CSRF?
See OWASP, Freedom to Tinker, and Chris Shiflett’s site for some solid explanations of CSRF.
In summary, a CSRF vulnerability is when a third-party website (evil-attacker.com) can convince your browser to make a request to a site where you’re already logged in (good-site.com) and that site accepts the request as if you had initiated it yourself.
So what is clickjacking?
See OWASP and SecTheory.com for some good explanations of the issues at hand.
In summary, a clickjacking vulnerabilities involves an attacker convincing you to initiate a request to a site (good-site.com) by interacting with UI elements on that site when you think you’re actually interacting with another site (say, evil-attacker.com).
Wait, those sound pretty similar
Yes, they do. But there is a very important distinction between them: a clickjacking attack requires the victim to interact with UI elements on a targeted website, whereas CSRF does not inherently require interaction on the victim’s part.
So how does
X-Frame-Options fit in?
X-Frame-Options is a mitigation technique for clickjacking attacks. It
is an HTTP response header sent by the server to indicate under what
circumstances page contents should be displayed in a frame context. A
browser that understands the header will not display the contents of a
page if the header directive is violated (for instance, if
evil-example.com puts good-site.com in an iframe but good-site.com sends
a header that says
X-Frame-Options: DENY. Thus, no clickjacking can
occur because no UI elements can be displayed to a victim.
It provides no protection against CSRF. Why? Because CSRF isn’t
concerned with the display of a page. In a CSRF attack, the attacker
doesn’t care about the response at all: the request is the only
important thing. Thus,
X-Frame-Options can provide no protection and
no mitigation for CSRF. |
Understanding me103 wireless security options, Understanding me103 wireless security options -4 – NETGEAR ME103 User Manual
Reference Manual for the ME103 802.11b ProSafe Wireless Access Point
Basic Installation and Configuration
Understanding ME103 Wireless Security Options
Unlike wired network data, your wireless data transmissions can be received well beyond your
walls by anyone with a compatible adapter. For this reason, use the security features of your
wireless equipment. The ME103 Access Point provides highly effective security features which
are covered in detail in this chapter. Deploy the security features appropriate to your needs.
Figure 3-1: ME103 wireless data security options
There are several ways you can enhance the security of your wireless network:
Restrict Access Based on MAC address. You can restrict access to only trusted PCs so that
unknown PCs cannot wirelessly connect to the ME103. MAC address filtering adds an
obstacle against unwanted access to your network, but the data broadcast over the wireless link
is fully exposed.
Turn Off the Broadcast of the Wireless Network Name (SSID). If you disable broadcast of
the SSID, only devices that have the correct SSID can connect. This nullifies the wireless
network ‘discovery’ feature of some products such as Windows XP, but the data is still fully
exposed to a determined snoop using specialized test equipment like wireless sniffers.
Use WEP. Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) data encryption provides data security. WEP
Shared Key authentication and WEP data encryption will block all but the most determined
Implement 802.1x. IEEE 802.1x provides very strong security. Although it can use the same
data encryption scheme as WEP, it enables stronger authentication as well as the ability to
dynamically vary the encryption keys.
1) Open System: Easy but no security
2) MAC Access List: No data security
3) WEP: Security but some vulnerabilities
4) 802.1x: Secure
Range: Up to 500 Feet
ProSafe Wireless Access Point |
Welcome to the Virus Encyclopedia of Panda Security.
It connects to an IRC server and waits for remote control commands to be performed on the affected computer. On demand, it can spread via AOL Instant Messenger.
|First detected on:||May 17, 2005|
|Detection updated on:||May 18, 2005|
|Yes, using TruPrevent Technologies
Oscarbot.F is a worm with backdoor characteristics that connects to the IRC server jupedatass.edhak.info, joins a certain channel and waits for remote control commands to be carried out on the affected computer. These control commands include downloading and running files, for example.
Though Oscarbot.F does not spread automatically by itself, it can be instructed to use AOL Instant Messenger in order to send messages to all the addresses in the Contact List. These messages include an URL that, on accessing it, download a copy of this worm or other kind of malware to the affected computer.
Oscarbot.F is difficult to recognize, as it does not display any messages or warnings that indicate it has reached the computer. |
|CVSS Meta Temp Score|
CVSS is a standardized scoring system to determine possibilities of attacks. The Temp Score considers temporal factors like disclosure, exploit and countermeasures. The unique Meta Score calculates the average score of different sources to provide a normalized scoring system.
|Current Exploit Price (≈)|
Our analysts are monitoring exploit markets and are in contact with vulnerability brokers. The range indicates the observed or calculated exploit price to be seen on exploit markets. A good indicator to understand the monetary effort required for and the popularity of an attack.
|CTI Interest Score|
Our Cyber Threat Intelligence team is monitoring different web sites, mailing lists, exploit markets and social media networks. The CTI Interest Score identifies the interest of attackers and the security community for this specific vulnerability in real-time. A high score indicates an elevated risk to be targeted for this vulnerability.
A vulnerability classified as critical was found in Linux Kernel up to 5.9.1 (Operating System). This vulnerability affects an unknown code block of the component dom0 Event Handler. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a denial of service vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is CWE-404. As an impact it is known to affect availability. CVE summarizes:
An issue was discovered in the Linux kernel through 5.9.1, as used with Xen through 4.14.x. Guest OS users can cause a denial of service (host OS hang) via a high rate of events to dom0, aka CID-e99502f76271.
The weakness was shared 10/23/2020. The advisory is shared for download at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability was named CVE-2020-27673 since 10/22/2020. Access to the local network is required for this attack. The requirement for exploitation is a single authentication. There are neither technical details nor an exploit publicly available. The MITRE ATT&CK project declares the attack technique as T1499.
Applying a patch is able to eliminate this problem.
CVSSv3VulDB Meta Base Score: 5.6
VulDB Meta Temp Score: 5.4
VulDB Base Score: 5.7
VulDB Temp Score: 5.5
VulDB Vector: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍
NVD Base Score: 5.5
NVD Vector: 🔒
VulDB Base Score: 🔒
VulDB Temp Score: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍
NVD Base Score: 🔒
ExploitingClass: Denial of service
Status: Not defined
Price Prediction: 🔍
Current Price Estimation: 🔒
Threat IntelligenceThreat: 🔍
0-Day Time: 🔒
Timeline10/22/2020 CVE assigned
10/23/2020 +1 days Advisory disclosed
10/23/2020 +0 days VulDB entry created
11/26/2020 +34 days VulDB last update
CVE: CVE-2020-27673 (🔒)
EntryCreated: 10/23/2020 01:50 PM
Updated: 11/26/2020 03:19 PM
Changes: (18) vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_av vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_ac vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_pr vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_ui vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_s vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_c vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_i vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_a vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_av vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_ac vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_au vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_ci vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_ii vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_ai vulnerability_cvss3_meta_basescore vulnerability_cvss3_meta_tempscore vulnerability_cvss2_nvd_basescore vulnerability_cvss3_nvd_basescore
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A new technique that makes use of Server Message Block (SMB) servers to circumvent malware scans from Windows Defender has been discovered, potentially raising the risk of unwanted software to discreetly be installed on systems.
According to cybersecurity firm CyberArk, the exploit, dubbed as 'Illusion Gap,' exploits a step in the file scanning process of Windows Defender in SMB shares. It starts by the attacker convincing a user to execute a file in a malicious SMB server under their control. When this is done, Windows will typically ask for two copies of the executable; first to launch the program and create a process for it, and second for Windows Defender, which it scans for malicious content.
This is where the problem comes in. Since SMB servers can distinguish between the two requests, attackers can take advantage of this and configure it to send two completely different files. This means that the Windows PE loader can receive a malicious file, but the one sent to Windows Defender can be clean. And with this in consideration, since the antivirus program detected a safe file, Windows PE will now proceed with the execution of the program. Obviously, this bypass technique could lead to more exploits in the future.
CyberArk forwarded the issue to Microsoft, which did not see any area of concern:
Thanks for your email. Based on your report, successful attack requires a user to run/trust content from an untrusted SMB share backed by a custom server that can change its behavior depending on the access pattern. This doesn’t seem to be a security issue but a feature request which I have forwarded to the engineering group.
Thanks again for reporting security issues to Microsoft responsibly and we appreciate your effort in doing so.
"It’s Windows Defenders job to scan and find malicious files – this vulnerability allows malicious files to bypass it, so it’s not doing its job," according to Kobi Ben Naim, CyberArk's Senior Director of Cyber Research in an email with BleepingComputer. "Other than installing additional AV or endpoint scanning software along with Windows Defender, there isn’t much an organization can do to mitigate this specific vulnerability."
CyberArk, however, points out that the problem might also exist in other antivirus solutions. This area has not been explored yet by the firm.
All things considered, it is always best to be careful of the files we open or programs we execute, as these potentially contain malicious code that can pose problems for our PCs. Doing this alone could already go a long way, no matter the antivirus program installed. |
You want to monitor your network for changes in resource type behavior, which can be an early sign of data exfiltration.
This sample search uses Stream DNS data. You can replace this source with any other DNS data used in your organization.
Run the following search. You can optimize it by specifying an index and adjusting the time range.
eventtype="stream_dns" message_type="Query" | timechart span=1h count BY record_type
The table provides an explanation of what each part of this search achieves. You can adjust this query based on the specifics of your environment.
Search only Stream DNS events.
Search for queries.
| timechart span=1h count BY record_type
Display a table that shows the types of DNS records accessed during one hour increments over the time span you set the search for.
Examine the results for changes in types of records being queried. Both A records and TXT records should be observed carefully as these are commonly used in command and control or exfiltration activity. If you have already identified a suspicious IP address, you can add it to the search to see if it is correlated with the changes in record types queried. You can also use the results to build a baseline or set thresholds for alerts.
Finally, you might be interested in other processes associated with the Monitoring a network for DNS exfiltration use case. |
TeamTNT is using new, open source tools to steal usernames and passwords from infected machines.
The group is targeting various operating systems including: Windows, different Linux distributions including Alpine (used for containers), AWS, Docker, and Kubernetes.
The campaign has been active for approximately one month and is responsible for thousands of infections globally.
Many malware samples still have zero antivirus (AV) detections and others have low detection rates.
Analysis of components used in the “Chimaera” campaign
New credentials stealer (“Lazagne” component)
The malicious script starts its activity by modifying the bash history file. This hides any future commands executed from users using the “history” command on Linux.
The script then installs its dependencies (‘curl’, ‘bash’, ‘wget’, ‘pip’, ‘py3-pip’, ‘python3-pip’).
Supported operating systems include different Linux distributions, such as Alpine Linux which is typically used in containers.
Once the malware is finished with its “pre-setup,” it downloads the second phase of the attack from its C&C, which includes another bash script (‘run.sh’) along with the Lazagne project.
Lazagne is an open-source project available for different operating systems (Windows, Linux, and MacOS). Its developer describes the Lazagne tool as an application that can be used to retrieve multiple passwords stored on a local machine. Due to its capabilities, the tool has been added as a post exploitation module to the pupy project.
It supports a wide range of programs, such as browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Opera, etc.), Sysadmin programs (such as CoreFTP, Putty, OpenSSH, etc. ), Wifi password, mail programs, databases, etc. The full list of supported programs can be found on the Lazagne page on Github.
In this phase two of the attack, the second malicious script executes the Lazagne tool, saves its output into “laZagne.out.txt,” and uploads it to the C&C using the curl command. At the end of the execution, the malware deletes any file that has been downloaded.
Windows component – Set up a cryptocurrency miner
For Windows operating systems, the attackers use a malicious script that downloads all the tools required for unpacking and executing the Xmrig miner.
This includes the 7z tool for decompressing downloaded files and Nssm to add the miner as a service.
The malware will setup the miner and then the miner will persist it in the system in two ways:
1) by adding itself as a service if the malware gains admin privileges or
2) by adding the batch file to the startup folder.
Kubernetes root payload component
This component is mainly responsible for installing a cryptocurrency miner on infected devices, allowing the attacker to connect remotely to the system using SSH.
The malicious script uses the following steps to achieve its goal:
Disabling or uninstalling security products on infected machines, such as Aegis Authenticator, quartz, and Alibaba services (AliSecGuard, AliYunDun, AliNet etc.).
Adding the attacker’s RSA-key to the list of known SSH host (allowing the attacker to connect the machine through SSH without the need of user/password in the system).
Installing missing required tools for crypto mining.
Modifying the host file.
Setting up the XMRig crypto miner.
Adding persistence for the XMR miner.
TeamTNT AWS stealer
Similar to the other TeamTNT components, the AWS stealer first installs missing dependencies. It then collects information from infected devices and stores the informaiton in a temporary file “/var/tmp/TeamTNT_AWS_STEALER.txt”.
This information includes:
AWS default region
AWS access key Id
AWS secret access key
AWS session token
AWS user credentials
AWS root credentials
Shared credentials file
Container credential relative URI
When finished, the malware uploads all of the stored information to its C&C using curl command, and then it cleans up its traces.
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In case you needed yet another example of why your IoT devices shouldn’t be exposed to the internet, a large swath of Hikvision IP Cameras have a serious RCE vulnerability. CVE-2021-36260 was discovered by the firm Watchful_IP in the UK. In Hikvision’s disclosure, they refer to the problem as a command injection vulnerability in the device’s web interface. The vuln is pre-authentication, and requires no user interaction. This could be something as simple as a language chooser not sanitizing the inputs on the back-end, and being able to use backticks or a semicolon to trigger an arbitrary command.
Now you’re probably thinking, “I don’t use Hikvision cameras.” The sneaky truth is that a bunch of cameras with different brand names are actually Hikvision hardware, with their firmware based on the Hikvision SDK. The outstanding question about this particular vulnerability is whether it’s present in any of the re-labelled cameras. Since the exact vulnerability has yet to be disclosed, it’s hard to know for sure whether the relabeled units are vulnerable. But if we were betting…
Linux Malware on Windows
In retrospect it should probably be obvious, but the Windows Subsystem for Linux was destined to be yet another vector for infection for Windows machines. It’s finally happened in the wild, and Black Lotus Labs has the scoop. The actual malware sample is a Python script compiled into an ELF binary, designed to run inside the WSL environment. From there, it makes calls out to the Windows API. The advantage of using WSL ..
Support the originator by clicking the read the rest link below. |
Research by Siddartha Sharma and Ashwin Vamshi
Uptycs' threat research team has discovered a new Botnet named ‘Simps’ attributed to Keksec group primarily focussed on DDOS activities. We discovered the Simps Botnet binaries downloaded via shell script sample and Remote Code Execution vulnerability exploits by Gafgyt - detailed in our earlier post.
Based on our analysis and threat intelligence, we have the following observations:
- Simps Botnet binary uses Mirai & Gafgyt modules for DDOS functionality
- The Botnet might be in the early stages of development because of the presence of the infected.log file after execution
- The author behind this Botnet has a Youtube channel and Discord Server for the usage and demonstration of the Botnet
- The Youtube channel and the historical data provided evidence that Simps Botnet is active since April 2021
- The Discord server discussions and threat intel data provided us evidence of the possible association of Simps Botnet to Keksec group
This post will cover details on our discovery, threat intelligence data attributing relations to Keksec group, working of the binaries and the code similarity, and reuse modules of Simps Botnet.
Discovery of Simps Botnet
During the first week of May 2021, the Uptycs’ threat research team detected a shell script and Gafgyt malware downloading Simps binaries from the same C2- 23.95.80[.]200.
Shell Script Downloading Simps Binary
The shell script (hash: c2d5e54544742b7a1b04cf45047859a10bb90c6945d340120872f575aa866e6d), ‘ur0a.sh’ was downloaded from the C2 URL 23.95.80[.]200.
The script downloaded several next stage payloads for several *nix architectures from the open directory named “Simps” in the same C2 URL from where the shell script was downloaded (see Figure 1)
Figure 1: Malicious Shell script dropping payloads
The script performs the following:
- Uses Wget to fetch the payloads from 23.95.80[.]200 in simps directory to tmp.
- Changes permission using chmod.
- Deletion of the payloads using the command rm.
On execution of the Simps binary, it drops a log file containing that the device has been infected with malware by Simps Botnet (see Figure 2)
Figure 2: Dropped log file
The binary also connects to the C2 23.95.80[.]200 (see figure 3)
Figure 3: C2 communication
Gafgyt Downloading Simps Binary
During this same time, Gafgyt binary (hash: e847dfbd831df6015519d03d42ada8241ce1174e9bd96f405452627617229c63) was also downloading Simps binary from the same C2 URL. The Simps payload was delivered by exploiting multiple Remote Code Execution vulnerabilities in vulnerable IOT devices. An excerpt of Realtek and Linksys router exploits downloading the next stage payloads. (see Figure 4 and 5)
Figure 4: Linksys router exploit
Figure 5: Realtek router exploit
Both these exploits downloaded a Simps MIPS UPX packed binary (hash - 6d18b433183fc68cd7b731fed198732d3460a21afba53163f059152bd410b55f), for MIPS architecture which also displays a message that the device has been infected by Simps Botnet (see Figure 6)
Figure 6: Simps ELF execution
Simps Botnet - Youtube Channel & Discord Server
While looking into the historical data of our threat intelligence systems and passive DNS records, we identified several malicious URLs (hash in IOCs section below) downloading a shell script named ur0a.sh and containing Simps next stage payloads. Another commonality was the Simps Botnet infection log message. Searching for these common entries led us to a YouTube video titled “Simps Botnet😈, Slamming!!!”, created by a user named “itz UR0A'' created on 24 April 2021. (see Figure 7)
Figure 7: Youtube video demo of Simps Botnet
The Youtube link also contained a Discord server link of “UR0A”, which was also present in the infection log. (see Figure 8)
Figure 8: Simps Botnet Discord server
Keksec Attribution With Simps Botnet
The Discord server contained several discussions around DDOS activities and Botnets carrying different names. One binary we identified in a chat conversation named gay.x86 (hash: e258a284d5cad584a14df27f022c99515de1cec69ab3157640d1ce7584c50ecd). Upon execution, it displayed a message that the system is pawned by md5hashguy (see Figure 9)
Figure 9: Discord message
We also came across another Gafgyt malware from a Joesandbox report, that contained the Infected By Simps Botnet ;) message. This malware dropped a file name “keksec.infected.you.log” that contained a message “youve been infected by urmommy, thanks for joining keksec..” (see Figure 10)
Figure 10: keksec.infected.you.log file
Interestingly, the same Discord server also contained an users named “urmommy” and “698a20e0da24bcebca57f09b7d695f8d#2881” who actively involved in DDOS activities and Botnet discussions. All this data gathered tied reactions Simps Botnet and the Discord server users related to Keksec group. This group is also referred as Kek Security, which according to NSFOCUS is a group which operates HybridMQ-keksec, a Botnet created with Trojan programs. HybridMQ-keksec is a DDoS Trojan program obtained by combining and modifying the source code of Mirai and Gafgyt.”
Figure 11: TCP flood module of Simps and Mirai
Figure 12: UDP flood module of Simps and Mirai
Similarly, Simps binaries also have the Valve source Engine and OVH modules which were also seen in a variant of Gafgyt that targeted Huawei and Asus Routers and killed its rival IoT Botnets. The code similarity of the Valve source Engine module used by Simps was similar to Gafgyt. (see Figure 13)
Figure 13: VSE attack module of Simps and Gafgyt
Uptycs EDR Detections
Uptycs’ EDR capabilities, armed with YARA process scanning, detected Simps downloader shell-script activity (See Figure 13) and the Simps ELF binary with a threat score of 10/10 (See Figure 14).
Figure 14: Shell script detection
Figure 15: Simps binary detection
Additionally, Uptycs’ EDR also detects the outbound connection of the malware C2 URLs via our threat intelligence.
Our research initially started with the discovery and analysis of Simps Botnet binaries used for DDOS activities. Using Uptycs’ EDR, threat intelligence data and Open-source intelligence (OSINT) we were able to tie relations and attribute Simps Botnet to the Keksec group. The Uptycs threat research team has reported the associated Discord server, Youtube and Github links to the concerned entities. We will continue to monitor the developments of this group and share updates.
We recommend the following measures for enterprise users and administrators to identify and protect against such attacks
- Regularly monitor the suspicious processes, events, and network traffic spawned on the execution of any untrusted binary / scripts.
- Always be cautious in executing shell-scripts from unknown or untrusted sources.
- Keep systems and firmware updated with the latest releases and patches.
- For more on IOC's, URL's and YARA, see below after the break
Want to learn more about how Uptycs EDR can improve security transparency in your hybrid cloud environment? Click below to see a live demo.
malware_name = "Simps"
description = "Simps is a Botnet that uses several DDOS modules from Mirai and Gafgyt"
author = "Uptycs Inc."
version = "1"
$simps_0 = "Infected By Simps Botnet" ascii wide nocase
$simps_1 = "This Device Has successfully Been Infected" ascii wide nocase
all of ($simps*) |
Software vulnerabilities typically cost organizations an average of $300,000 per security incident. Efforts aimed at eliminating software vulnerabilities must focus on secure coding, preventing the vulnerabilities from being deployed into production code. "Between 2010 and 2015, buffer overflows accounted for between 10-16% of publicly reported security vulnerabilities in the U.S. National Vulnerability Database each year," Microsoft researcher David Narditi wrote in a recent report. In March, the Secure Coding Team in the SEI's CERT Division published the 2016 edition of our SEI CERT C++ Coding Standard and made it freely available for download. In this blog post I will highlight some distinctive rules from the standard.
As part of an ongoing effort to keep you informed about our latest work, this blog post summarizes some recently published SEI technical reports, white papers, podcasts and webinars on software assurance, data governance, self-adaptive systems, engineering high-assurance software for distributed adaptive real-time (DART) systems, technical debt, and automating malware collection and analysis. These publications highlight the latest work of SEI technologists in these areas. This post includes a listing of each publication, author(s), and links where they can be accessed on the SEI website.
The network time protocol (NTP) synchronizes the time of a computer client or server to another server or within a few milliseconds of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). NTP servers, long considered a foundational service of the Internet, have more recently been used to amplify large-scale Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. While 2016 did not see a noticeable uptick in the frequency of DDoS attacks, the last 12 months have witnessed some of the largest DDoS attacks, according to Akamai's State of the Internet/Security report. One issue that attackers have exploited is abusable NTP servers. In 2014, there were over seven million abusable NTP servers. As a result of software upgrades, repaired configuration files, or the simple fact that ISPs and IXPs have decided to block NTP traffic, the number of abusable servers dropped by almost 99 percent in a matter months, according to a January 2015 article in ACM Queue. But there is still work to be done. It only takes 5,000 abusable NTP servers to generate a DDoS attack in the range of 50-400 Gbps. In this blog post, I explore the challenges of NTP and prescribe some best practices for securing accurate time with this protocol.
In the 2016 Cyber Security Intelligence Index, IBM found that 60 percent of all cyber attacks were carried out by insiders. One reason that insider threat remains so problematic is that organizations typically respond to these threats with negative technical incentives, such as practices that monitor employee behavior, detect and punish misbehavior, and otherwise try to force employees to act in the best interest of the organization. In contrast, this blog post highlights results from our recent research that suggests organizations need to take a more holistic approach to mitigating insider threat: one that incorporates human involvement. In particular, positive incentives can produce better balance and security for organizations by complementing traditional practices to insider threat programs. This post also presents three practices to increase positive incentives that organizations can use to reduce insider threat.
As cyber-physical systems continue to proliferate, the ability of cyber operators to support armed engagements (kinetic missions) will be critical for the Department of Defense (DoD) to maintain a technological advantage over adversaries. However, current training for cyber operators focuses entirely on the cyber aspect of operations and ignores the realities and constraints of supporting a larger mission. Similarly, kinetic operators largely think of cyber capabilities as a strategic, rather than a tactical resource, and are untrained in how to leverage the capabilities cyber operators can provide. In this blog post, I present Cyber Kinetic Effects Integration, also known as CKEI, which is a program developed at the SEI's CERT Division that allows the training of combined arms and cyber engagements in a virtual battlefield.
Since its debut on Jeopardy in 2011, IBM's Watson has generated a lot of interest in potential applications across many industries. I recently led a research team investigating whether the Department of Defense (DoD) could use Watson to improve software assurance and help acquisition professionals assemble and review relevant evidence from documents. As this blog post describes, our work examined whether typical developers could build an IBM Watson application to support an assurance review.
Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks have been dominating the IT security headlines. A flurry of reporting followed the September 2016 attack on the computer security reporter Brian Krebs's web site KrebsonSecurity when he reported attack traffic that was at the unprecedented scale of gigabytes per second. In November, my colleague Rachel Kartch wrote "DDOS Attacks: Four Best Practices for Prevention and Response," outlining what we can do to defend against these attacks. In this blog post, I tell the story of the Mirai powered botnet that's been harnessed in some of these recent attacks and which has also received its own share of press. My purpose is to explore the vulnerabilities that Mirai exploits and describe some simple practices that could help transform our Internet devices to mitigate the risk posed by botnets.
First responders, search-and-rescue teams, and military personnel often work in "tactical edge" environments defined by limited computing resources, rapidly changing mission requirements, high levels of stress, and limited connectivity. In these tactical edge environments, software applications that enable tasks such as face recognition, language translation, decision support, and mission planning and execution are critical due to computing and battery limitations on mobile devices. Our work on tactical cloudlets addresses some of these challenges by providing a forward-deployed platform for computation offload and data staging (see previous posts).
When establishing communication between two nodes--such as a mobile device and a tactical cloudlet in the field--identification, authentication, and authorization provide the information and assurances necessary for the nodes to trust each other (i.e., mutual trust). A common solution for establishing trust is to create and share credentials in advance and then use an online trusted authority to validate the credentials of the nodes. The tactical environments in which first responders, search-and-rescue, and military personnel operate, however, do not consistently provide access to that online authority or certificate repository because they are disconnected, intermittent, limited (DIL). This blog post, excerpted from the recently published IEEE paper "Establishing Trusted Identities in Disconnected Edge Environments"--I coauthored this paper with Sebastián Echeverría, Dan Klinedinst, Keegan Williams--presents a solution for establishing trusted identities in disconnected environments based on secure key generation and exchange in the field, as well as an evaluation and implementation of the solution. |
Welcome back my fellow hackers! Today we’re going to be starting the topic of maintaining access. First, we’ll discuss the concept of maintaining access and why it’s important. Then we’ll move on to our lab where we’ll compromise a PC and set up a backdoor so we can come back to it.
The Concept of Maintaining Access
When a system is compromised, the attacker is given temporary access to it (not including compromised management services such as SSH, telnet, etc.). If the system were to power cycle or the gained access be interrupted by some means, access would be lost. But, if quick action is taken by the attacker upon initial compromise, access can be maintained or persistent.
This persistent access often takes the form of a backdoor, which starts along with the system to give the attacker access without need for further exploitation. Launching a high number of exploits in an attempt to gain access to the same system is likely to alert an admin (a good one at least), and might lock you out for good. So, persistent access is definitely the way to go.
Maintaining Access with Metasploit
Now that we’ve discussed what exactly is means to obtain persistent access, we can go ahead and try it for ourselves. Thankfully, Metasploit comes equipped to get the job done. First we’ll gain access to the victim PC, then we’ll establish our persistent access. Once that’s all done, we’ll restart the victim PC and reconnect to the backdoor!
Step 1: Initial Compromise
Since this isn’t an exploitation lesson we’re not going to get too fancy here. We’ll be using Metasploit’s web delivery module to download and execute our payload from the victim PC. First we’ll go ahead and set up the web delivery module:
Once its loaded the module, we’ll use the show options command to see what options we need to set in order to run this module:
Looking at the options here, it seems we need to set a URIPATH, a new payload, the payloads LHOST, and the exploit target ID. I’ll be setting the URIPATH to “/pwn” because its randomized otherwise. The LHOST should be the local IP address of the attacking machine, the payload should be the Windows reverse TCP meterpreter, and the target ID should be 2 for windows powershell:
Note: while it is not shown in the screenshot, you must change the payload to windows/meterpreter/reverse_tcp or any other Windows compatible payload.
Now that we’ve got our options set, we should be able to use the exploit command to get everything rolling. Once it starts, it will generate a command that we need to run on the target machine. Since our payload server is listening on port 8080, our regular HTTP port 80 is still available. So I’ll be copying our command from Metasploit into a file in /var/www/html/ (the root directory for the apache2 web service). Once we’ve got the command copied to a text file, we can start the apache2 service:
With that squared away, we can move over to our victim PC and point the browser at our attackers local IP address. In the URL, specify the file you wrote the command to, in my case its command:
Now all we have to do is open up CMD on the victim station and paste our command (if you’re in the wild a rubber ducky might be useful):
Now that we’ve run our command, the CMD should close. Going back to our attacker machine, we can see that we now have a meterpreter session running on the victim PC:
Step 2: Privilege Escalation
So we’ve got access. But we don’t have enough access. Right now we’re running with the same privileges as the user. If we want persistent access, we very well might need more rights. To gain these privileges, we’ll use Metasploit’s local exploit suggester:
Setting our session number to one, we should be able to gather information on how we can further exploit this system:
After some time waiting (and bit more time sifting through results) we can conclude that this system is vulnerable to Schlamperei (CVE-2013-1300) allowing us to gain SYSTEM privileges. Let’s go ahead and load up the Metasploit module:
This is a pretty simple module, so we’ll set our session number to one and fire away:
Now that we’ve got a second meterpreter session, let’s take a look at our privileges:
There we have it! We now have SYSTEM privileges and can move on to setting up our persistent access. Note: you may want to act fast, in my experience the schlamperei module yields SYSTEM privileges, but can be downgraded back to user privileges over time.
Step 3: Establishing Persistent Access
So, we’ve got our SYSTEM access and we’re ready to go. Now we’ll be using our NT AUTHORITY level meterpreter session to establish a persistent backdoor to this victim. From within the meterpreter, we can use the run command along with the persistence script to view the help page:
Ideally, I would’ve liked to have used the -S option for a deeper foothold, but was given some access errors. I’ll be finding a way around this (probably manually installing the backdoor) but for now we’ll be using the -U flag, which will start the backdoor when the user logs in. We’ll also be using -i to specify the interval between connection attempts, the -p flag to specify the port number to connect back on, and the -r flag to specify the remote host (attacker machine or C&C server) to connect back to:
Let’s break down what the persistence script is doing right now. First is build a resource file to cleanup the backdoor. A resource file is a file used by metasploit to perform a series of commands (sort of like a macro). Once the resource file is built, it creates the payload. In this case our payload is a reverse TCP meterpreter. After the payload is generated and written as a persistent script to a randomly chosen temporary directory, an entry is made into the registry. This entry will start the script that was written when the user logs in. To view this registry key, open regedit on the Windows machine and navigate to the path shown in your output.
Step 4: Returning to the Victim Machine
Now that we have our backdoor installed and ready to go, we’ll close metasploit and re-open it, as well as power off the victim PC. Once metasploit opens back up we need to set up our handler to catch the connection from the backdoor. For this we’ll use the multi/handler module configured with the options we set when we ran the persistence script:
The handler is now listening on port 31337 for the reverse connection. Let’s go ahead and power up our victim PC:
Once the victim PC is powered up, we should log the victim user in and keep an eye on our Metasploit console to see the handler catch the reverse connection from the backdoor:
There we go! Our handler caught the reverse connection and now we have another meterpreter session after the victim PC was reset. Just to prove that our access truly is persistent, let’s kill the new session and get a new one:
As you can see in the above screenshots, the session we received from the victim did not have SYSTEM privileges, but regular user privileges. This is due to using the -U flag instead of the -S flag in the persistence module and is something I intend to resolve in the next article, where we’ll be attempting to build our own backdoor instead of letting Metasploit do all the work for us! |
The base tool for the construction of the SNOUT site is Ning, a free online
service for creating, customising and sharing social networks. The Ning platform
Ning services and database as well as to external web services such as Flickr
and RSS feeds. The Ning documentation offers snippets of code allowing for easy
integration of these services. For SNOUT, it was essential to include an
instance of Google Maps on the site in order to map the environmental sensor
information detected by the carnival characters during the SNOUT event. As there
is no option to add Google Maps to a site using Ning's site templates, the SNOUT
site was built from scratch using Ning's 'developer' option. This allows
complete control over the code while maintaining access to Ning services such as
site back-ups, access to social networking lists etc.
Figure 5.3 shows the website. |
Missing Authentication for Critical Function
Sing-box is an open source proxy system. Versions prior to 1.4.5 and 1.5.x prior to 1.5.0-rc.5 are subject to an authentication bypass when specially crafted requests are sent to sing-box. This affects all SOCKS5 inbounds with user authentication and an attacker may be able to bypass authentication. Users unable to update should not expose the SOCKS5 inbound to insecure environments. NOTE: The vulnerability originally affects the module "github.com/sagernet/sing" versions prior to 0.2.12.
CWE-306 - Missing Authentication for Critical Function
The software does not perform any authentication for functionality that requires a provable user identity or consumes a significant amount of resources. |
Privilege Escalation is a topic which most of CTF players and OSCP students struggle with. Privilege Escalation in general is to get more privilege but in this context it means getting root privilege which is the highest privilege in the system. In this article I am going to explain 7 methods of Linux privilege escalation with exploitation steps and how to fix them. But as a perquisites you must have Linux essentials for example the knowledge of how to use command line and the Linux permission model. To follow up with this tutorial we are going to use a vulnerable machine called LinESC which was created by me. You can download From Here. the default user is “muhammad” and password is “nasef”.
1) Misconfigured Permissions
Some files are meant to be read only by root others can be read by anyone but write only by root. Sometimes files’ permissions are misconfigured, for example the /etc/shadow which stores the passwords of the whole system. no one could read it except root.
In this machine /etc/shadow is readable by everyone. so, we could easily see the root password’s hash and crack it using john or hashcat.
- To check the permissions of /etc/shadow use
ls -la /etc/ | grep shadow
- If it’s readable you could view the hash by
- store the hash in a file and run john over it using the rockyou wordlist.
Set the suitable permission for the suitable file. In this case we should remove the reading permission from the other users.
SUDO is a feature in Linux which allows User A to execute certain commands as User B. Sometimes the user may exectue certian commands as root. so, we may abuse this feature to gain privilege escalation.
to list the commands allowed for the user to execute as other users
- As you see we can execute three commands as (root)
- going to /home/vuln/2 we can read the source code of the script. It just starts a new shell but because we are executing this command as root. we will get root shell.
Set the suitable permission for the suitable file. In this case remove the whole entry from /etc/sudoers.
SUID is a special permission which allows any user to execute file as the owner of the file. So, if the owner of the file is root then any user may execute this file as root.
find / -perm -4000 2> /dev/null
to list all files with SUID permissions in the system.
- We found that an executable with the name
- going to
we found the source code which basically do the same thing as sudo file.
- Because SUID is set and the owner is root we were able to get the shell as root.
Set the suitable permission for the suitable file. In this case remove the suid permission from the file.
Cronjobs are scheduled commands & scripts which automatically run at certain interval of time as a specific user. If a certain script is executed at certain interval of time as root, and we are able to modify this script. we may get root shell.
to list all files with SUID permissions in the system.
- We found that a script is executed every minute as root.
- Checking the content of the script we found that it’s simply copies the file passwd to replace /etc/passwd so we could simply modify /etc/passwd and add another user with root permission then logging to it.
Create password with mkpasswd.
Copy the root entry from passwd file and modify the user and password with the password we created above.
Wait 1 minute until the script is executed so you could easily su to the created user.
Check the scheduled tasks for the root and remove the unnecessary ones or the ones that may be exploited. In our case remove the script.sh task.
5) Misconfigured Services
Some services may be misconfigured which leads to privilege escalation.
A famous misconfiguration is the NFS no-root-squashing. NFS is a protocol which allows the server to share specified directories with other computers.
If computerA has two users (muhammad,root). Muhammad created a file in the share then the owner will be muhammad of computerA but the problem arises when root from computerA creates a file in the share. the NFS will confuse the root of computerA with the root of the share. So if the root in computerA created a script and added suid permission for file in the server share. then a simple user in the server may run this script as the root of the share. which is very dangerous.
see the exported shares.
- You will find that /home/muhammad is shared but more importantly the no-root-squashing is enabled. So, we will exploit it.
- In our machine mount the share using
mount -o rw,vers=2 192.168.190.142:/home/muhammad /mnt/exploit/
- Since we are root in kali Linux, then any file we create in the share will be owned by the root of the share and giving suid permission will allow user muhammad to run this file as root. so we may create a script which copies an existing passwd but with added user -as in crontab example step 4 and 5- file to /etc/passswd. anyway the I wrote this script and it’s in /home/muhammad/vuln/4 .
- Add new user in passwd as in crontab exaple step 4 and 5.
- Give the script SUID and execution Permessions
chmod +sx script.sh
- From the vulnerable system run the script and voila the new root user is added!
- su to the newly created user.
To solve misconfigured services, we must reconfigure the service. In our case remove the no-root-squashing.
There are some cases where root’s password due to bad practices is available in plain sight and we will talk only about two cases because there are unlimited number of password management issues. This method of privilege escalation is hard to find because there is no direct way to find stored passwords. but it’s useful to check the config files of the running services, because there might be password reuse. also check the system directories and try to check if there is a suspicious file.
if you typed the command history it will give you the history of commands done by the user.
Inspecting the output, you will find two important lines. The first is telling you to follow my twitter account @nasefmuhammad which you should do :D . The second is a mistyped command by the user. His intention is to su root and then type the password but instead of doing that he wrote “sudo root chicken”, and chicken is the root’s password.
SSH identification keys may allow you in some cases to ssh login to the intended user without using password. So, you need to store the ssh keys in a secure place where the intended user is the only one has access.
In our case the root keys are stored in /home/muhammad/vuln/3/key so simply we used the ssh -i command to ssh login as root user.
The solution for these kinds of problems are obvious. Just follow the best practices of storing passwords.
7) Kernel Exploitation
Linux kernel like any software has a history of critical vulnerabilities. Some of these vulnerabilities may led to critical situations as privilege escalation, So we always need to check the kernel version then search for it in exploitdb or any other exploit databases.
We can check for kernel version using the following command
Then searching in exploitdb for suitable exploit
A famous reoccurring exploit in ctf is dirtycow and you could read more about it From Here
First we are going to download the exploit From Here
- Then we are going to compile it as mentioned in the exploit.
- run the exploit.
- after it finishes run /usr/bin/passwd and you are root!
After the exploitation you will found that a new user with root privileges is created and you are now root!
The solution for kernel exploits is to keep your system updated. In our case we must ditch the 8.04 ubuntu and get a supported version.
These are the most common 7 ways of getting privilege escalation in Linux system. If you have any question you can email me at [email protected] and follow me at @nasefmuhammad in twitter. Thanks for your time! |
Researchers have uncovered over a dozen servers, unusually registered in the United States, which are hosting ten different malware families spread through phishing campaigns potentially tied to the Necurs botnet.
On Thursday, researchers from Bromium said they have monitored scams connected to this infrastructure during the May 2018 to March 2019 time period.
Five families of banking Trojans — Dridex, Gootkit, IcedID, Nymaim, and Trickbot — two ransomware variants, Gandcrab and Hermes, as well as three information stealers, Fareit, Neutrino, and Azorult, were all found on the servers.
It is unusual for such malware to be found on infrastructure hosted in the US, given the country’s law enforcement agencies are generally quick off the mark to seize and take down malicious infrastructure when informed of its existence.
One of the servers belongs to a single autonomous system and is a so-called “bulletproof” hosting service, which generally turns a blind eye to the subject material hosted, whether or not it is malicious or illegal. Another 11 servers involved belong to a company which is based in Nevada and sells virtual private server (VPS) hosting.
“One possible reason for choosing a US hosting provider is so that the HTTP connections to download the malware from the web servers are more likely to succeed inside organizations that block traffic to and from countries that fall outside of their typical profile of network traffic,” Bromium suggests.
The cybersecurity researchers say that the malware families hosted on the servers have been distributed in multiple, mass phishing campaigns. Email and hosting infrastructure has been separated from command-and-control (C2) systems, which further suggests the servers are being used by “distinct” threat groups — some of which are responsible for email and hosting, while others are responsible for managing malware.
After tracing the spam and phishing campaigns tied to the malicious infrastructure, Bromium says that email is the main attack vector of all attacks detected. Microsoft Word files containing malicious VBA macros are the weaponized document of choice.
The phishing campaigns also appear to be US-centric, with lure emails written in English and masquerading as well-known US organizations, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
See also: Home DNA kit company asks you to upload your family tree for the FBI
The most popular phishing lure was a job application, followed by an unpaid invoice demand.
Another interesting element of the infrastructure is the rapid compilation of malware samples and how quickly they were hosted. In some cases, such as with samples of Hermes and Dridex, compilation and hosting would take only a few hours and no longer than 24 hours.
“The quick turnaround from compilation to hosting suggests an organized relationship between malware developers and the operators of the distribution infrastructure,” the researchers say.
The cyberattackers were also observed hosting multiple malware families designed to work in tandem with each other. Phishing campaigns spotted in July and August 2018 were connected to this behavior, in which Azorult — an information stealer — was paired with the Hermes ransomware.
Servers are also being reused for different campaigns. On March 9, for example, a server was being used to distribute the IcedID banking Trojan. A week later, the same server was being used to host Dridex. In another case, Bromium observed a single web server being used to host no less than six different malware families over 40 days.
TechRepublic: What is the Dark Web, and why is it so bad if your information is there?
Bromium says that there are indicators present which suggest the servers may be tied to campaigns related to the Necurs botnet.
One of the servers was used to host a recent sample of Dridex in March this year. In addition, all of the malware hosted on the US infrastructure has been used for high-volume spam campaigns conducted by means which are consistent with the tactics used by the Necurs botnet operators.
Unlike the other campaigns, the web server used for Dridex had basic HTTP authentication in place, potentially to thwart researchers in their discovery of the malware’s presence on the server.
CNET: Kaspersky Lab will warn you if your phone is infected with stalkerware
“The username and password pair in that campaign was ‘username’ and ‘password’, and the name of the delivered file was ‘test1.exe’, suggesting that this may have been a trial campaign,” Bromium says. “Given the relative lull of Dridex activity for several months, this may be an indication of preparation for larger Dridex campaigns to come, or the adoption of HTTP basic authentication in other campaigns.”
Previous and related coverage
Phish Fight: Securing Enterprise Communications
Yes, much of the world may have moved on from email to social media and culturally dubious TikTok dances, yet traditional electronic mail remains a foundation of business communication. And sadly, it remains a prime vector for malware, data leakage, and phishing attacks that can undermine enterprise protections. It doesn’t have to be that way.
In a just released report titled “GigaOm Radar for Phishing Prevention and Detection,” GigaOm Analyst Simon Gibson surveyed more than a dozen enterprise-focused email security solutions. He found a range of approaches to securing communications that often can be fitted together to provide critical, defense-in-depth protection against even determined attackers.
Figure 1. GigaOm Radar for Email Phishing Prevention and Detection
“When evaluating these vendors and their solutions, it is important to consider your own business and workflow,” Gibson writes in the report, stressing the need to deploy solutions that best address your organization’s business workflow and email traffic. “For some it may be preferable to settle on one comprehensive solution, while for others building a best-of-breed architecture from multiple vendors may be preferable.”
In a field of competent solutions, Gibson found that Forcepoint, purchased recently by Raytheon, stood apart thanks to the layered protections provided by its Advanced Classification Engine. Area 1 and Zimperium, meanwhile, are both leaders that exhibit significant momentum, with Area 1 boosted by its recent solution partnership with Virtru, and Zimperium excelling in its deep commitment to mobile message security.
A mobile focus is timely, Gibson says in a video interview for GigaOm. He says companies are “tuning the spigot on” and enabling unprecedented access and reliance on mobile devices, which is creating an urgent need to get ahead of threats.
Gibson’s conclusion in the report? He singles out three things: Defense in depth, awareness of existing patterns and infrastructure, and a healthy respect for the “human factor” that can make security so hard to lock down.
When Is a DevSecOps Vendor Not a DevSecOps Vendor?
DevOps’ general aim is to enable a more efficient process for producing software and technology solutions and bringing stakeholders together to speed up delivery. But we know from experience that this inherently creative, outcome-driven approach often forgets about one thing until too late in the process—security. Too often, security is brought into the timeline just before deployment, risking last minute headaches and major delays. The security team is pushed into being the Greek chorus of the process, “ruining everyone’s fun” by demanding changes and slowing things down.
But as we know, in the complex, multi-cloud and containerized environment we find ourselves in, security is becoming more important and challenging than ever. And the costs of security failure are not only measured in slower deployment, but in compliance breaches and reputational damage.
The term “DevSecOps” has been coined to characterize how security needs to be at the heart of the DevOps process. This is in part principle and part tools. As a principle, DevSecOps fits with the concept of “shifting left,” that is, ensuring that security is treated as early as possible in the development process. So far, so simple.
From a tooling perspective, however, things get more complicated, not least because the market has seen a number of platforms marketing themselves as DevSecOps. As we have been writing our Key Criteria report on the subject, we have learned that not all DevSecOps vendors are necessarily DevSecOps vendors. Specifically, we have learned to distinguish capabilities that directly enable the goals of DevSecOps from a process perspective, from those designed to support DevSecOps practices. We could define them as: “Those that do, and those that help.”
This is how to tell the two types of vendor apart and how to use them.
Vendors Enabling DevSecOps: “Tools That Do”
A number of tools work to facilitate the DevSecOps process -– let’s bite the bullet and call them DevSecOps tools. They help teams set out each stage of software development, bringing siloed teams together behind a unified vision that allows fast, high-quality development, with security considerations at its core. DevSecOps tools work across the development process, for example:
- Create: Help to set and implement policy
- Develop: Apply guidance to the process and aid its implementation
- Test: Facilitate and guide security testing procedures
- Deploy: Provide reports to assure confidence to deploy the application
The key element that sets these tool sets apart is the ability to automate and reduce friction within the development process. They will prompt action, stop a team from moving from one stage to another if the process has not adequately addressed security concerns, and guide the roadmap for the development from start to finish.
Supporting DevSecOps: “Tools That Help”
In this category we place those tools which aid the execution, and monitoring, of good DevSecOps principles. Security scanning and application/infrastructure hardening tools are a key element of these processes: Software composition analysis (SCA) forms a part of the development stage, static/dynamic application security testing (SAST/DAST) is integral to the test stage and runtime app protection (RASP) is a key to the Deploy stage.
Tools like this are a vital part of the security layer of security tooling, especially just before deployment – and they often come with APIs so they can be plugged into the CI/CD process. However, while these capabilities are very important to DevSecOps, they can be seen in more of a supporting role, rather than being DevSecOps tools per se.
DevSecOps-washing is not a good idea for the enterprise
While one might argue that security should never have been shifted right, DevSecOps exists to ensure that security best practices take place across the development lifecycle. A corollary exists to the idea of “tools that help,” namely that organizations implementing these tools are not “doing DevSecOps,” any more than vendors providing these tools are DevSecOps vendors.
The only way to “do” DevSecOps is to fully embrace security at a process management and governance level: This means assessing risk, defining policy, setting review gates, and disallowing progress for insecure deliverables. Organizations that embrace DevSecOps can get help from what we are calling DevSecOps tools, as well as from scanning and hardening tools that help support its goals.
At the end of the day, all security and governance boils down to risk: If you buy a scanning tool so you can check a box that says “DevSecOps,” you are potentially adding to your risk posture, rather than mitigating it. So, get your DevSecOps strategy fixed first, then consider how you can add automation, visibility, and control using “tools that do,” as well as benefit from “tools that help.”
High Performance Application Security Testing
This free 1-hour webinar from GigaOm Research. It is hosted by an expert in Application and API testing, and GigaOm analyst, Jake Dolezal. His presentation will focus on the results of high performance testing we completed against two security mechanisms: ModSecurity on NGINX and NGINX App Protect. Additionally, we tested the AWS Web Application Firewall (WAF) as a fully managed security offering.
While performance is important, it is only one criterion for a Web Application Firewall selection. The results of the report are revealing about these platforms. The methodology will be shown with clarity and transparency on how you might replicate these tests to mimic your own workloads and requirements.
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|Backdoor.Hacarmy.D is a Backdoor Trojan horse that gives an attacker control over a compromised computer.
When Backdoor.Hacarmy.D runs, it does the following:
Copies itself as %System%\ZoneLockup.exe.
Adds the value: "Winsock32driver"="ZoneLockup.exe"
to the registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Attempts to connect to an IRC server at port 6667. If successful, it allows the remote attacker to perform some of the following actions:
- Download and execute files
- Terminate processes
- Steal system information, such as operating system information, system uptime, current user name, IP address, and host name
Automatic removal: Use antivirus (also check How To Remove section)Startup Optimizer to remove this adware from startup. |
“I am a creeper … catch me if you can!” The year was 1971, and this message began to appear on several ARPANET computers. At that time, nobody had seen anything like it in the computer world, a program that replicated itself and spread from one node to another through the network.
The program was called Creeper (creeper), and today is considered the first computer virus in history. It was not a malicious program, and it simply traveled through the network replicating itself and showing this message wherever it went. However, it was the beginning of something, since as a direct response to the challenge that was supposed to end soon after the first antivirus was born.
The first virus, which was not a virus
The first computer programs capable of replicating themselves were already predicted in 1949 by the mathematician John von Neumann, who was the first to theorize about something similar to a computer virus or worm. However, it was not until 1971 that the engineer Robert H. (Bob) Thomas created his Creeper turning the theory into reality.
Thomas worked for BBN Techonologies in Massachusetts, United States, the same company that employed the creator of the email Ray Tomlinson, and where other geniuses like Vinton Cerf, Robert Kahn or JCR Licklider worked.
Creeper was an experiment designed to demonstrate that a program could be able to travel the network jumping from one computer to another while performing a specific task. Their goal was the DEC PDP-10 computers with the TENEX operating system, which were the predominant ones in the research centers and American universities that made up ARPANET.
However, despite being considered the first virus in history, in practice not everyone agrees with being defined as such. Not only because the concept of computer virus would not be born until the 80, but because it was not meant to hurt, but to demonstrate the mobile applications of the software.
Creeper could print a file, but then it would stop. Then it looked for another computer with TENEX, it established a connection, it was copied in him beginning to show his message and it was erased of the equipment in which it had been. Come on, that more than replicating itself (something that only a few times), was jumping from node to node.
Continue Reading: What is Ransomware? How does it act? How to prevent it?
But it was still a piece of software fast and elusive, and that was a challenge for the rest of computer geniuses of the time. This made Creeper a revulsive that served to end up creating what we could define as the first antivirus in history.
It was called Reaper, which means reaper for that reason to go against the “creeper”, and was designed very shortly after by the father of the email Ray Tomlinson. His only mission was to eliminate Creeper from the computers where he was hiding, for which he imitated his attitude by traveling and replying himself among the computers on the network.
The concept develops in the seventies
Two years after Creeper and Reaper, in 1973, the film Westworld by Michael Crichton showed the concept of computer virus as we know it today. He used it as the thread of a film in which a malfunction makes the robots of a park behave as they should not. One of the characters defines the problem as a pattern that suggests an infectious disease process that extends from one machine to another.
But it was a year later when it arrived that perhaps it is the first malicious computer virus that is known. It was called Rabbit, rabbit, and played without stopping making copies of itself in a single computer to clog the system reducing performance and causing it to end up blocking.
Then, in 1981, the first virus came to great escape. It was called Elk Cloner and was written by Richard Skrenta for the Apple II, considered particularly vulnerable due to storage of its operating system on diskette. The virus was installed on a computer when an infected floppy disk was inserted, and it monitored the disk accesses to infect the boot sectors of others that were inserted to jump from computer to computer.
The author of the piece of software himself admitted that just by restarting the computer the virus was erased from its internal memory. However at the time there was very little knowledge of the dangers of malware and its methods of expansion, so the habits of the users ended up making Elk Cloner achieve a remarkable reach.
Five years later, in 1986, the first virus for IBM PC compatible computers was released. It was called BRAIN, and it infected the boot sectors of the MS-DOS operating system. It was distributed through unofficial copies of the operating system, and its purpose was to monitor the software in an attempt to stop and account for the illegal copies that were made.
It had the particularity to warn the owners of the computers that had been infected, offering the contact information of its author. In the message that showed you told you that you had been infected , and that you contacted them for the vaccine. Since then, computer viruses have not stopped evolving, but that’s another story. |
Because of a recent data breach at Mailchimp, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center (HC3) issued a warning about the risk of phishing attacks using this email marketing platform.
The breach was discovered when Trezor, a cryptocurrency hardware wallet provider, looked into a phishing campaign targeting its clients that utilized the email addresses signed up to Trezor accounts, which revealed a data breach at Mailchimp.
Mailchimp’s investigation affirmed that threat actors had successfully compromised internal accounts of its client support and account administration teams, and although those accounts were already secured, the attackers had gained access to the 300 Mailchimp users’ accounts and had extracted audience information from 102 of those accounts. The attackers also obtained API keys that enabled them to make email campaigns to be used in phishing attacks without needing to access client portals.
Considering that accounts employed by Mailchimp clients for sending marketing campaigns such as newsletters can be whitelisted by subscribers, any phishing campaigns carried out utilizing the breached accounts may find the emails mailed to inboxes. HC3 says it is just aware of one phishing campaign being done employing a compromised account, which targeted customers in the cryptocurrency and financial industries, however, there is a threat that campaigns can also be performed targeting consumers in the healthcare and public health (HPH) industry.
HC3 has urged companies in the HPH industry to take steps to minimize the threat. HC3 states the best defense is user awareness training because phishing emails will be sent from a legitimate and trustworthy sender. Workers must be advised about the threat and be directed to be cautious of any emails received via Mailchimp. Although phishing emails may be sent, malware may likewise be sent. Antivirus software ought to be used, network intrusion prevention systems are advantageous, and HC3 additionally suggests utilizing web filters to limit access to internet content that is not required for business operations.
Anti-spoofing and other email authentication systems are furthermore recommended. These consist of doing validity checks of the sender domain employing SPK, validating the reliability of messages utilizing DKIM, and examining to ensure the sender is authorized to utilize the domain employing DMARC. |
The line printer daemon (lpd) in the lpr package in multiple Linux
operating systems authenticates by comparing the reverse-resolved
hostname of the local machine to the hostname of the print server as
returned by gethostname, which allows remote attackers to bypass
intended access controls by modifying the DNS for the attacking IP.
Note:References are provided for the convenience of the reader to help distinguish between vulnerabilities. The list is not intended to be complete.
Disclaimer: The entry creation date may reflect when
the CVE-ID was allocated or reserved, and does not
necessarily indicate when this vulnerability was
discovered, shared with the affected vendor, publicly
disclosed, or updated in CVE.
This is an entry on the CVE
list, which standardizes names for security |
Black Hat Conference: Socket to me
A security researcher has demonstrated a way to hijack Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) sessions to intercept login data.
Moxie Marlinspike, who spoke at the Black Hat security conference, explained how to subvert an SSL session by performing a man-in-the-middle attack. The anarchist researcher explained in a YouTube video that the attack uses a tool developed called SSLstrip, which exploits the interface between http and https sessions.
“SSL strip man-in-the-middles of all the potential SSL connections on the network, specifically attacking the bridge between http and https,” Marlinspike said in the video.
Secure Sockets Layer and its successor Transport Layer Security are cryptographic protocols used to encrypt communications over TCP/IP networks. Banks and other organizations use SSL and TLS to secure web transactions.
The attack relies on users not directly calling up an SSL session by typing a URL into a browser. Most users initiate sessions by clicking on a button. These buttons are located on unencrypted http pages, and clicking on them will take users to encrypted https pages to log in.
“That opens up all kinds of avenues for ways that you might intercept [details],” Marlinspike said. In his Black Hat presentation, he claimed to have gathered details on 117 e-mail accounts, seven PayPal logins, and 16 credit card numbers, within a 24 hour period.
SSLstrip works by watching http traffic, then by acting as a proxy when a user attempts to initiate an https session. While the user believes the secure session started, and SSLstrip has connected to the secure server via https, all traffic between the user and SSLstrip is http.
This means “disastrous warnings” displayed by browsers do not occur, and the session appears normal. That is when the harvesting of login details takes place.
While most everyone accepts SSL as being secure, security researchers have claimed outsiders can intercept SSL communications.
Separately, a group of U.S. government security organizations has listed the top 20 security actions they recommend organizations should take to improve computer security, reported ZDNet. It is the “Twenty Most Important Controls and Metrics for Effective Cyber Defense and Continuous FISMA Compliance.” A conglomerate of U.S. government agencies, including NSA, US-Cert, various U.S. Department of Defense computer security groups, and security training organization Sans Institute published the list in late February. View it at http://www.sans.org/cag/.
Alan Paller, director of Sans Institute, said the list, also known as the Consensus Audit Guidelines, would spark “a complete revolution in federal and business cyber security.”
Nicholas Sheble ([email protected]) writes and edits Automation Update. |
A simple pure-Python TCP Connect port scanner. This application leverages the use of Python's Standard Library asyncio framework to execute a number of TCP connections to an arbitrary number ports on target IP addresses, taking a
An automation tool that scans sub-domains using multiple tools. Most importantly, it greps all the words from the first, second and N level of subdomains and creates a wordlist. Then uses crt.sh to brute force every single name to
A proxy tool that records communication (requests, websockets) between client and server. This recording can later be used for tests as a mock backend. It works in 2 modes, RECORD and PLAYBACK, capturing and reproducing the server
Tool to find the real IP behind CDNs/WAFs like cloudflare using passive recon by retrieving the favicon hash. For the same hash value, all the possible IPs, PORTs and SSL/TLS Certs are searched to validate the target in-scope.
Developers commonly use apps like ngrok, localtunnel, or cloudflared to expose a local web service at a publicly-accessible URL. This is useful for developing with HTTPS or sharing a site preview with a colleague or client.
In the security test for android apps, we can specify a local proxy server or local DNS server from the Wifi settings and use a proxy tool to check request and response. Since it is troublesome to configure this from the GUI, we c
TinyCheck allows you to easily capture network communications from a smartphone or any device which can be associated to a Wi-Fi access point in order to quickly analyze them. This can be used to check if any suspect or malicious
TunnelPy simply exposes any service, running internally in a network/host, to the outside, by creating a tunnel between a client on the outside, and any internal host in a network, by pivoting from/to a 'middle-man' host that is a
Blackstone is a spaCy model and library for processing long-form, unstructured legal text. Here, we wrap Blackstone with a performant API layer written in Go. Communication between Blackstone and the API layer happens via gRPC. |
Technology has advanced significantly over the years. At the moment, people can make use of wireless security cameras to monitor their homes, offices, and other buildings. Wireless security cameras have become popular surveillance tools. Most people have opted for wireless security cameras since they offer flexibility, and they can also be moved from one area to another. The wireless security cameras are easy to install, and you will not have to secure the services of a technician. Here are tips to follow when installing the security cameras according to the wireless security camera.
Less equipment is required when installing wireless security cameras. Most of the wireless security cameras do not have to be hard-wired into the property. The wireless security cameras can be mounted on the walls, and you will not have to procure extra tools and accessories during the installation process. To install the wireless security cameras, you should follow these steps:
- It would help if you first decided where you want to install the wireless security cameras. Also, make sure that you have decided on the specific angles. The location can always be changed in case there are any miscalculations. For starters, you should start with a general idea.
- Choose the suitable height and angle that you will use when installing the camera. It is advisable to install the surveillance at high places so that intruders cannot access them easily. The higher angles will also have a broader range, and that means that people should place the cameras at the highest point possible so that the surveillance equipment over the desired space.
- Wireless security cameras usually have mounting brackets. The surveillance cameras should be mounted against the wall in a specific location. You should mark a screw hole with a pencil.
- Using a small bit, you should drill a small hole. The hole should be smaller than the bracket’s screws. The small holes will ensure that the screws can easily enter the wall, and they will not damage the wall.
- The mounting bracket should be held against the wall so that the screw holes can align with the holes that have been drilled on the wall. Ensure that the mounting bracket has been secured before you can install the surveillance cameras.
- The surveillance camera should be plugged into the bracket. You should also insert some batteries and make sure that the camera is working accordingly. The bracket should be secure before you can install the wireless security camera.
The traditional security cameras are normally hard-wired into each building. As for the wireless cameras, they usually rely on wireless receivers. Some of the factors to consider include the space that can be present between the wireless camera and the receiver. The users should install the equipment in convenient locations in their homes or business premises. A wireless receiver can pick up a signal within a 10-mile radius. Wireless security cameras have also proven to be effective over the years. |
Apache, officially known as Apache HTTP Server, is an open-source and free web server software that powers most of the websites around the world. Recently, one Critical and two High severity flaws were fixed in Apache httpd 2.4.44. These flaws were tracked as CVE-2020-9490, CVE-2020-11984, and CVE-2020-11993 – out of which, CVE-2020-9490 is the most severe one. Credit for discovering the three CVEs goes to Felix Wilhelm of Google Project Zero.
- CVE-2020-9490: Push Diary Crash on Specifically Crafted HTTP/2 Header
- CVE-2020-11993: Push Diary Crash on Specifically Crafted HTTP/2 Header
- CVE-2020-11984: mod_proxy_uwsgi buffer overflow
According to the advisory published by Apache for CVE-2020-9490, “Apache’s mod_http2 module supports a feature called Push Diary that keeps track of all resources already pushed over a single HTTP/2 connection. To avoid unnecessary pushes on new connections, clients can initialize or replace the active Push Diary by sending a base64-encoded diary in the ‘Cache-Digest’ header.” Furthermore, “A specially crafted value for the ‘Cache-Digest’ header in a HTTP/2 request would result in a crash when the server actually tries to HTTP/2 PUSH a resource afterwards.”
For CVE-2020-11984, a possible buffer overflow in mod_proxy_uwsgi module might lead to a potential RCE.
For CVE-2020-11993, on certain traffic edge patterns, when debug was enabled for HTTP/2 module, it was observed that memory pools were used concurrently, and logging statement were made on unwanted connection resulting in memory corruption flaw.
No vulnerabilities were observed to have been exploited in the wild at the time of writing this blog. Although it is strongly recommended to patch up Apache web servers to the latest and fixed version with appropriate permissions.
- CVE-2020-9490 and CVE-2020-11993 – Apache HTTP Server versions 2.4.20 to 2.4.43
- CVE-2020-11984 – Apache HTTP Server versions 2.4.32 to 2.4.43
On unpatched servers
- Configuring the HTTP/2 feature via “H2Push off” will mitigate this vulnerability for unpatched servers.
- Configuring the LogLevel of mod_http2 above “info” will mitigate this vulnerability for unpatched servers.
Qualys Policy Compliance customers can evaluate workaround based on following Controls and refer to their evaluation definitions
1. 19187 Status of the ‘H2Push’ directive in the apache configuration file (Server Level)
2. 19188 The Status of the ‘LogLevel’ directive in the Apache configuration file (Server Level)
Users are advised to update their Apache Web Server installations to the latest version Apache httpd 2.4.44.
Qualys customers can scan their network with QIDs 13929 and 13938 to detect vulnerable assets.
Please continue to follow Qualys Threat Protection for more coverage on latest vulnerabilities. |
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Continue reading “Encyclopedia of Cyber Warfare”
Instituto Sagres gave the lecture “The Intelligence and Cyber Power”. The event occurred on 19 September 2012 and was part of the Cyber Intelligence Symposium, organized by the Brazilian Army Intelligence School (EsIMEx).
The approach is an analogy with the rise of Air Power and its Theories, as well as Air Forces, from the invention of the balloon, by priest Bartolomeu de Gusmão, to the present day, under the focus of Intelligence for military use. Examines aspects of the emergence of Air Power Theories and as in its early days the air vector was seen only as a tool for Intelligence, without any military value as stated by Marshal Foch in 1910, notably with use only for the (Aerial) Reconnaissance, replacing the cavalry and later seen as a replacement to the high spots on the ground, as the Military Doctrine of the time. In this analogy, we have uncovered a probable metric for chronology of emergent Cyber Power in function of the use of the Fifth Dimension: Cyberspace; until then only seen as a source of Intelligence, without any military value. The author leads the audience to question at what timeline point, in the use of Cyberspace, we would be: at the time of the Duque de Caxias balloons (or American Civil War) or UAV? The speaker brings to reflect the questioning of how far away we are from what could be Cyber Power Theories and Cyber Forces (the next Force among Armed Forces) and how Intelligence has and will have a key role in this evolution.
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All political and military conflicts now have a cyber dimension, the size and impact of which are difficult to predict. Internet-enabled propaganda, espionage and attacks on critical infrastructure can target decision makers, weapons systems and citizens in general, during times of peace or war. Traditional threats to national security now have a digital delivery mechanism which would increase the speed, diffusion and power of an attack. There have been no true cyber wars to date, but cyber battles of great consequence are easy to find. This book is divided into two sections – Strategic Viewpoints and Technical Challenges & Solutions – and highlights the growing connection between computer security and national security.
IOS Press is an international science, technical and medical publisher of high-quality books for academics, scientists, and professionals in all fields.
Some of the areas we publish in:
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In this blog, we publish three new vulnerabilities (CVE-2021-31986, CVE-2021-31987, CVE-2021-31988) affecting all Axis devices based on the embedded Axis OS. This follows our earlier work on vulnerability research on IoT video camera platforms published here. This information is being published as part of a coordinated disclosure with the vendor, Axis, which has released firmware that fixes the issue. Details on the nature of the vulnerabilities can be found below, and specific remediation steps are in the conclusion of this post.
While documenting our research for these vulnerabilities, we describe how the transparent approach applied by Axis into security review allowed researchers to perform an immediate static analysis of the vulnerabilities and to precisely execute dynamic tests to validate them, dramatically optimizing the effort required for a review by any asset owner.
In 1883, the Dutch linguist and cryptographer Auguste Kerckhoffs, in his essay La Cryptographie Militaire, described six fundamentals for the practical design of a ciphersuite. One of these passed into history as the cardinal principle of any modern cryptosystem:
“The design of a system should not require secrecy, and compromise of the system should not inconvenience the correspondents.”
The idea behind what is known as the Kerckhoffs’s principle is simple: the security of a cryptosystem shall not rely on the secrecy of its operation or components. Instead, it shall rely on limited, key information that, if kept secret, guarantees that all security requirements of the scheme are satisfied, regardless of whether an enemy knows the details of its inner workings or not.
Despite being formulated more than a century ago and being specifically relevant to cryptography, Kerckhoffs’s principle still applies today for the security design and review of modern IT, OT and IoT devices. Notably, devices shall be conceived to be as transparent and open as possible, in order to allow independent reviewers to have all necessary access and instruments to analyze their security.
This stands in contrast with the “security by obscurity” approach, which instead bases the security of a system on the concealment of its operation and with the publication of the least possible amount of information on it. This latter solution historically proved to be unsuccessful in the long run, to the point that standard bodies such as NIST have started advocating against it.1
Security Through Obscurity
In a recent blog post, we unveiled a new Remote Code Execution vulnerability affecting the N48PBB, a popular Network Video Recorder (NVR) manufactured by Annke.2 During that analysis, we obtained the first hint of the presence of a vulnerability when, while fuzzing HTTP endpoints, we managed to make the device reboot on its own after sending a very large payload.
Nevertheless, in order to precisely triage and validate the vulnerability, a significant effort had to be applied:
- The device allowed on-demand access via SSH, but only to a restricted shell which proved to be useless for debugging purposes;
- No firmware was readily available for our analysis;
- When we managed to obtain access to the firmware, it proved to be encrypted.
Indeed, all these countermeasures caused the analysis to take longer than expected. This might create a sense of security, because attackers, in order to create and finely tune attack payloads, need to invest a substantial effort to reverse engineer the obfuscation steps and obtain complete access to the device.
However, it must be highlighted that this does not have any effect on the presence or absence of vulnerabilities in the product, whether someone discovers them or not.
Moreover, a side effect is that security researchers and asset owners both need to invest the same effort in order to find and responsibly disclose bugs to the vendor, to the point that some might decide to abandon the review and keep a product inside their network whose security state is unknown.
The Axis Companion Recorder
Continuing our research on IP video surveillance systems, we decided to investigate the security of a long-time manufacturer of IP video surveillance equipment, i.e., Axis Communications.3 To do so, we purchased an Axis Companion Recorder, a compact NVR capable of supporting up to 8 PoE IP cameras directly connected to it. For more information about NVRs, please refer to our previous blog,2 containing a detailed description of their operation as well as their security.
Immediately after setting up the device, the transparent approach adopted by Axis is evident.
First, the device allows out-of-the-box, unrestricted remote access via the SSH service, which can be enabled through the web interface.
Secondly, firmware images can be freely downloaded from the Axis website and analyzed. The popular “binwalk” tool can be used to unpack the images. In the screenshot below, firmware version 184.108.40.206 is extracted and the contents of “/usr/bin” is listed.
This provides a superb analysis platform in case a security researcher or asset owner wants to perform a review or investigate any unusual behaviors, giving them all necessary access and tools.
Our research on the Axis Companion Recorder discovered the following vulnerabilities:
- Heap-based buffer overflow (CVE-2021-31986, CVSSv3 6.7)
- Improper recipient validation in network test functionalities (CVE-2021-31987, CVSSv3 4.1)
- SMTP header injection in email test functionality (CVE-2021-31988, CVSSv3 5.5)
CVE-2021-31986: Heap-based Buffer Overflow
The first vulnerability was found entirely by static analysis, and would hardly have been discovered by other means. The issue was noticed in the read callback function (the function set via the libcurl “CURLOPT_READFUNCTION” option) of the “libhttp_smtp_notify.so” library. Notably, the read callback function was noticed failing to verify that no more than “size” multiplied by “nitems” number of bytes are copied in the libcurl destination buffer (on our device, 64 kB).
Among the copied bytes, the read callback function copies in the libcurl destination buffer the “to”, “from”, “subject” and “body” HTTP parameters of the request to the endpoint “/axis-cgi/smtptest.cgi”, which is sent from the browser when a test of the SMTP configuration parameters is attempted. This request is normally a GET request; as such, the parameters are passed through the query string in the URL, which is limited to less than 10,000 characters, too few to trigger the issue. However, firmware-assisted manual analyses proved that POST requests are accepted as well by the endpoint, which are not restricted by the aforementioned limit. Finally, the possibility to connect via SSH to the device and attach a debugger to the CGI process dynamically confirmed the vulnerability.
Thus, a blackbox-only test would not have found the problem for the following reasons:
- The tester would need to change the request to use a different HTTP method (e.g., POST), to avoid the restriction posed by the query string, and know that the remote endpoint supports it;
- The tester would need to send the exact amount of bytes in the correct parameters;
- The tester would need to recognize that a memory corruption has happened, considering that no reboots are triggered on the device and that the only visible response is a generic “500 Internal Server Error”.
The SMTP test functionality resulted in being accessible only after authenticating to the device. However, note that the aforementioned HTTP request was devoid of any protections against Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) attacks. Additionally, as the application uses a Digest Authentication mechanism, modern browser-side mitigations such as “SameSite=Lax by default” cookies are not applicable.
As a result, by convincing a victim user into visiting a specifically crafted webpage while logged-in to the Companion Recorder web application, an external remote attacker is able to trigger a memory corruption on the device in the context of the “smtptest.cgi” process and, possibly, execute arbitrary code.
CVE-2021-31987: Improper Recipient Validation in Network Test Functionalities
The second vulnerability is another confirmation of the importance of a transparent approach to security. In this case, the vulnerability stems from the fact that the test functionalities of HTTP, email and TCP recipients have blocklist-based security checks to impede interactions with localhost-exposed network services, which could be circumvented with known bypasses or were incomplete.
By statically analyzing the firmware, the blocklist approach can be immediately spotted, as shown in the following evidence extracted from an analysis session of “httptest.cgi”.
Additionally, the possibility of uploading the famous “tcpdump” tool on the device dynamically confirmed the feasibility of sending requests to localhost-exposed services.
CVE-2021-31988: SMTP Header Injection in Email Test Functionality
The third vulnerability is due to an SMTP header injection, located in the aforementioned SMTP test functionality.
Again, the possibility of statically looking into the firmware allowed precise identification of the vulnerable parameter and verifying the absence of input validation functions, as shown in the following evidence extracted from an analysis session of “smtptest.cgi”:
Axis is in the process of releasing patches for all affected devices, on the Axis OS LTS & Active tracks4:
CVE-2021-31986 and CVE-2021-31988
- AXIS OS Active track 10.7
- AXIS OS 2016 LTS track 220.127.116.11
- AXIS OS 2018 LTS track 18.104.22.168
- AXIS OS 2020 LTS track 22.214.171.124
- AXIS OS Active track 10.8
- AXIS OS 2016 LTS track 126.96.36.199
- AXIS OS 2018 LTS track 188.8.131.52
- AXIS OS 2020 LTS track 184.108.40.206
Axis devices not included in these tracks and still under support will receive a patch according to their planned maintenance & release schedule.
We urge users to download and install the latest firmware version from the official Axis website to protect the devices from cyberattacks.
Nozomi Networks has released specific updates to its Threat Intelligence service to detect exploitation attempts of the vulnerabilities. Thankfully, the open, transparent design of the Axis portfolio allowed Nozomi Networks Labs to accelerate our research and identify these vulnerabilities expediently.
We thank Nozomi Networks for their research and good collaboration throughout the disclosure process. AXIS Communications welcomes researchers to inspect our devices and firmware as it is our belief that long-term sustainable cyber security is created through collaboration and transparency.Sebastian Hultqvist, Global Product Manager for AXIS OS
- “Guide to General Server Security,” National Institute of Standards and Technology
- “New Annke Vulnerability Shows Risks of IoT Security Camera Systems,” Nozomi Networks Labs
- “Axis OS LTS & Active tracks,” Axis.
The S3CUREC4M Project: Vulnerability Research in Modern IP Video Surveillance Technologies
Learn how to assess the security posture of an IP video surveillance system, including hardware extraction and firmware analysis techniques. |
CCTV systems can monitor activities and events in real-time, allowing organizations to respond quickly to incidents.Footage captured by CCTV systems can be used as evidence in legal proceedings or for incident investigations.
By monitoring activities and identifying potential safety hazards, CCTV systems can help to improve the safety of employees, customers, and other individuals.
As technology advances, CCTV systems can now be monitored and managed remotely, giving organizations more flexibility and accessibility.
It is critical to remember that the use of CCTV systems must adhere to privacy laws and regulations. Before installing a CCTV system, organizations should become acquainted with the local laws and regulations and ensure that their use of the system complies with these requirements. |
Posted April 19th, 2016.
Cisco’s Talos announced in a blog Friday that 3.2 million machines globally are at risk of a Samsam ransomware attack. Cisco Talos claims systems are at risk from unpatched versions of JBoss. Cisco’s IR Services Team received information about the attack from a recent customer engagement and began examining the JBoss vectors used as the...
Posted October 7th, 2015.
Cisco Talos managed to disrupt a major ransomware campaign that researchers believe netted a hacker more than $30 million per year. The team determined that the Angler Exploit Kit used proxy servers of service provider Limestone Networks with the primary threat actor responsible for up to 50 percent of Angler Exploit Kit activity,... |
Lately, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks have grown in popularity and effectiveness, undermining internet security. March kicked off with the most powerful DDoS attack in history: 1.35 terabytes of traffic hit GitHub, the collaborative developer platform. However, just a few days later, a new threat thwarted by Arbor Networks smashed that record, with a 1.7Tbps attack. Unlike the DDoS attack that Dyn suffered in 2016, these recent attacks used a method that is increasingly popular with cybercriminals and does not require botnets. Criminals take advantage of vulnerabilities of thousands of improperly configured Memcached servers to launch attacks.
Memcached has become cybercriminals’ weapon of choice to carry out DDoS attacks. Memcached is a memory object caching system used to speed up web applications by reducing database load. Over the last couple of weeks, cybercriminals have intensified their efforts to exploit vulnerabilities in the Memcached protocol to try to launch record-breaking amplification attacks. What do these vulnerabilities consist of?
Around 100,000 Memcached servers are exposed without any authentication protection. This means that a cybercriminal can access them and send large volumes of data to try to saturate the servers, maximizing the servers’ response rates. That’s why attackers make use of these unprotected servers to increase attacks against a target. They spoof the IP address of their victims and send several data packets to Memcached servers which are designed to offer a more direct and faster response. The result: the system responds by flooding the victim with internet traffic. With high amounts of traffic sent per second – it’s estimated around 10 packets per second – the Memcached server amplifies the amount of traffic sent to a target. That’s why if the system lacks a sufficient filter, the huge wave of data sent can be more than enough to cause an outage.
In contrast to other DDoS threats, such as the Dyn attack, carrying out Memcached attacks is relatively simple. This is because it is not necessary to use botnets to generate the amount of traffic necessary to paralyze a system or network. The ease of carrying out these types of attacks, together with the existence of thousands of vulnerable Memcached servers, has made this threat one of this year’s main attack vectors.
How can I be prepared to deal with these attacks?
Some experts believe that Memcached-based attacks will continue to increase and could even exceed two terabytes per second. Futhermore, many attackers that use this specific type of DDoS attack are already beginning to monetize these types of attacks. Attackers take advantage of these vulnerabilities to extort their victims.
However, the good news is that some measures and tools are being developed to prevent and neutralize these attacks. Different security experts have revealed a technique that victims of DDoS attacks can use to stop attacks while they are happening. It consists in sending commands such as “shutdown \ r \ n”, o “flush_all \ r \ n” to the Memcached servers under attack to deactivate them and avoid amplification. Another effective way of preventing this type of threat consists in disabling the Memcached protocol of any server exposed to the network.
It’s obvious that cybercriminals will take advantage of Memcached server vulnerabilities to launch DDoS attacks in 2018. Therefore, in addition to the already mentioned measures to prevent possible Memcached attacks, it is crucial to have a detection and mitigation plan. It’s recommended to review in detail router and firewall configurations to stop all invalid IP addresses. It’s also advisable to limit traffic from a host to prevent saturating servers. A plan should also include a periodic study of TCP/UDP connections with the server to identify patterns of attack.
Above all, you should constantly monitor traffic on your company’s network to prevent unauthorized access. Solutions such as Panda Adaptive Defense 360 offer detailed visibility of all endpoint activity, complete control of all running processes and reduce the attack surface. With this approach, your company will be prepared to deal with any type of DDoS attack head on. |
After outsmarting Google earlier this year, a teenager hacker has managed another successful exploit of the Chrome browser at today’s Pwnium 2 hackathon competition. The hacker, who goes by the alias “Pinkie Pie”, achieved a full Chrome exploit, which should win him a $60,000 cash prize.
In March, Pinkie Pie and Sergey Glazunov both won $60,000 for their exploits at the first Pwnium competition. Google established the Pwnium competition as an alternative to the Pwn2own contest in order to add the requirement that participants provide details of their exploit.
The company had offered to hand out up to $2 million to those who discover vulnerabilities at Pwnium 2, which took place as part of the Hack In The Box security conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Google software engineer Chris Evans is in attendance and has promised to discuss any exploits and vulnerabilities found during the hackathon at a follow-up talk at the conference. Google will “be actively analyzing” any submissions in order to bulk up the security of its browser.
Update: Pwnium 2 has now closed with just the one submission from Pinkie Pie. Google has confirmed that it will pay the $60,000 prize and has already patched the flaw.
In order to qualify for the cash, his exploit must meet the following criteria:
• Be an unreported and original exploit, which has not been shared or partially shared with anyone else or submitted in any other contests until it has been submitted to, and judged by, Google.
• Be an exploit relying on an unreported and original bug, bugs or security feature in Chrome or in Chrome when used in connection with Windows, Flash or other software e.g. drivers.
• Be a remote exploit accessible through the Chrome browser, which works and is reliable.
• Be present in the most recent supported channel(s) of Chrome, running on the latest version of Windows7 on the provided test machine.
• Be a critical vulnerability of high impact.
• Be authored or created by You.
• Be submitted with corresponding documentation that details each bug exploited.
(hat tip Gunther_AR)
Header image credit: Hack In the Box |
Why does the Embedded Web App show a blank page?
There are usually two possible reasons for the Embedded WebApp to be showing a blank page:
Most current browsers block mixed content for security reasons. What this means is that the webpage you are on is on HTTPS and the page being loaded in the iframe is HTTP. To fix this problem, you can either configure your browser to allow mixed content or use HTTPS for both urls.
For security reasons, some sites do not allow the page to be loaded in an iframe, which is what the Embedded Web App uses. Many Web Applications protect themselves from a vulnerability called “Clickjacking” by adding X-Frame-Options in the Header to prevent that Web Application from being hosted in an iFrame. Clickjacking is where a hacker puts up a website that simply wraps the entire targeted Web Application in an iFrame, so that they can intercept the keys being pressed. It is in this way that they can steal the User’s account information and/or anything they enter into the targeted Web Application. Current browsers do support an ALLOW-FROM X-Frame-Option that would allow saying that the Web Application can be loaded in an iFrame, but only when in a different Web Application (like the Finesse Desktop).
You can see if the site is allowed in an iframe by using this iframe checker. |
CVE-2022-xxxx: CSRF token missing in forms
The Symfony form component provides a CSRF protection mechanism by using a random token injected in the form and using the session to store and control the token submitted by the user.
When using the FrameworkBundle, this protection can be enabled or disabled with the configuration. If the configuration is not specified, by default, the mechanism is enabled as long as the session is enabled.
In a recent change in the way the configuration is loaded, the default behavior has been dropped and, as a result, the CSRF protection is not enabled in form when not explicitly enabled, which makes the application sensible to CSRF attacks.
Symfony restored the default configuration to enable the CSRF protection by default.
The patch for this issue is available here for branch 5.3.
We would like to thank Catalin Dan and David Lochner for reporting the issue and Jérémy Derussé for fixing the issue. |
by Mendy Newman
Posted on October 25, 2022
Want to interview Mendy?Contact
In recent months, two new phishing approaches have been making waves and raising concerns. Both were publicized by mr. d0x, a penetration tester and security researcher who frequently publishes his findings to raise awareness about emerging threats. The first is a way to use Chromium’s application mode to build fake desktop apps for phishing. The other is technique for creating fake login forms on websites (or more accurately, forms that appear to be legitimate login forms on websites).
The first phishing technique leverages the – app command line flag, which is supported by Chromium-based browsers, to launch a site in a separate browser window in a manner that appears to be an app. For instance, it does not display an address bar and instead of Chrome or Edge favicons appearing in the task bar, the favicon of the website is displayed.
In order to have the “correct” favicon – i.e., the one for the spoofed app – appear in the task bar, the website address (which is hidden) must be associated with that favicon. This can be accomplished by copying the favicon of the site being spoofed and using it for the phishing website.
The spoofed phishing app can be delivered via an email with a shortcut link to the URL, including the “—app” parameter. Unfortunately, it is not hard to imagine a user receiving an email or text notification that they need to login to their Teams, Microsoft or Google account, clicking on the link, and logging in on an expertly spoofed app, as described above.
The second phishing technique reported by mr. d0x was actually publicized a number of months ago but has been making headlines again due to its use in a recent phishing attack that steals Steam Gaming accounts. This phishing campaign targets high-value professional gamer accounts, with the goal of selling account access.
The basic technique, as described by mr. d0x, creates a simulated browser window within an existing browser window that appears to be a sign-in window pop-up. What makes the technique especially effective – that is to say, nefarious – is that a genuine URL can be shown in the pop-up address bar, since it is not actually a window.
The recent attacks that leveraged this technique were delivered using a direct message on Steam. Selected high-value users were invited to join tournament teams, with a link to sign up on the site of a fake organization that claimed to host esports competitions. Visitors were asked to sign up to play, and when they clicked, a form that requested Steam credentials opened in a (seeming) pop-up.
The “overlay” of course, was in fact a fake window within the spoofed organization’s page that they were already on. The sign-in pop-up was designed to be highlight realistic. For instance, it displayed a genuine-looking Steam URL in the address bar and include a graphic of the SSL lock icon.
When a user entered credentials, they were prompted to enter the 2FA code by an additional form. Because the phishing site simultaneously passed login info to the actual Steam site, incorrect authentication information triggered an additional expertly spoofed form in real time to prompt the user to re-enter the 2FA code. And once they correctly authenticated, users were sent to a legitimate gaming site, to keep them from realizing that they have been had.
New phishing techniques are constantly being created to trick even very alert users, and old techniques are being updated. But the sad truth – for users, that is – is that phishing works, even when the techniques are nowhere near as sophisticated as those described above. Users are simply inundated with emails, text messages, IMs and pop-ups, and more often than not, if the graphics look right and the “required” action resembles any of the many usual sign-ins or clicks required of users every day, some people will fall for the phish.
To protect users from phishing, passive protection is the only reliable option. Ericom’s ZTEdge Web Isolation leverages remote browser isolation (RBI) to prevent users from falling for fake sign-in appeals on phishing sites, regardless of how convincing they may be. ZTEdge Web Isolation opens web sites with poor reputational ratings in read-only mode to prevent users from entering credentials of clicking on links – regardless of how convincingly the sites spoof normal sign-in procedures.
While the threat posed by phishing is troublesome for private users like gamers, it is exponentially more dangerous when those users use their personal, unmanaged devices to connect into enterprise networks. Once cybercriminals have access to a user device, they can monitor keystrokes to gather credentials for enterprise systems and web apps, as well as SaaS and cloud apps, to breach data, deliver ransomware and cause general havoc.
ZTEdge Web Application Isolation (WAI) protects organizations’ web-facing apps by inverting RBI to cloak application surfaces from threat actors’ view. It prevents them from probing for vulnerabilities that they can exploit. Because remote users can access web and cloud apps only via an isolated environment in the Ericom Global Cloud, enterprise apps are protected even if user credentials are stolen. WAI is a cloud-based solution that does not require any software to be installed on user devices.
Discover how Ericom ZTEdge Web Isolation and WAI can defend against even the most sophisticated phishing techniques. Contact us for a demo today.
The FBI-led takedown of Qakbot was an operation that involved seven countries. Malware was removed from 700,000 computers. But don’t think all that makes you safe.
Generative AI empowers its users to work fast, better and more efficiently. Alas, this includes cybercriminals, who are using malicious GenAI platforms to accelerate zero-day exploit creation.
Cybercriminals love the multiplier effect they get from attacking law firms: Hack in, and they get firm data PLUS juicy confidential client info. |
The 888 RAT is an old malware threat that was first offered for sale on underground hacker forums in 2018. Back then, it had far limited functionality and used to target only Windows devices. The price of this initial version was set at $80.
However, soon afterward, the developers of 888 RAT released an expanded Pro version that was capable of infecting Android devices. Later, an Extreme version also was released and now it could be used for the creation of Linux payloads. These versions were priced at $150 and $200 respectively. During this period, the 888 RAT remained largely unutilized by cybercriminal gangs. All that changed when the Pro version got cracked and released for free on several websites.
888 RAT Attack's Campaigns
Researchers have managed to detect three separate attack campaigns that used the 888 RAT as part of the delivered payloads. One is tracked under Spy TikTok Pro while another is an operation attributed to the Kasablanka group. However, the latest attack has been active since at least March 2020 and is targeting the Kurdish ethnic group specifically. The attackers deployed the Android version of the 888 RAT to carry out espionage activities on the compromised devices. So far, the campaign has been attributed to a cybergang tracked under the name BladeHawk.
BladeHawk's disguised the 888 RAT and, in small instances, a different malware threat named SpyNote as a legitimate application. As an initial compromise vector, the cybercriminals used dedicated Facebook profiles that lured their victims by posting news in Kurdish about events relevant for the Kurds' supporters. They also spread links leading to additional weaponized applications to public Facebook groups with pro-Kurd leanings. Researchers have confirmed that just a couple of bait Facebook posts have managed to register nearly 1,500 downloads of trojanized applications.
The Android version of the 888 RAT is capable of recognizing and executing 42 different commands that it receives from a Command-and-Control (C&C, C2) server. As such, the threat can perform a wide range of nefarious activities on the breached devices. It is equipped with the basic functions expected from an Android threat - manipulate, collect, or delete files, gather photos, access SMS messages, harvest the device's contact list and generate a list of all installed applications.
In addition, the 888 RAT can establish numerous espionage routines on the device. These include taking arbitrary screenshots, taking photos, sending text messages, making calls, recording the surrounding audio and phone calls conducted on the device, employing phishing techniques to collect the victim's Facebook credentials and more. |
Rogue Device Spotlight: #r00tabaga MultiPwner
How often the rogue device is used in the wild to conduct real-world attacks, with 1 being the rarest, 10 being widely used.
Another one of the “name brand” penetration testing devices, the #r00tabaga’s popularity stems from its usefulness to conduct multiple types of attacks on a tried and tested hardware platform.
The cost or “DIY burden” of the device, availability (ease of acquisition), and degree of skill necessary to deploy/operate the device, with 1 being expensive/difficult to build, not publicly available, and requiring deep technical expertise to operate, 10 being low-cost, available for purchase online, plug-and-play operation.
While the #r00tabaga is another of the pre-built penetration testing tools, its two potential uses make it both slightly more expensive and challenging to use than either of its parts. However, with instructions on how to set up your own #r00tabaga and the availability of purchase online, the tool is fairly simple to acquire, if not quite as easy to use.
The potential damage caused by successful execution of the attack, with 1 being exposure of trivial information from the target, 10 being organization-wide superuser-level compromise or equivalent.
Used properly, a #r00tabaga can cause the damage of a Pineapple Hak5 or the MiniPwner. As always, the full exposure of information of the target depends heavily on the way that the organization’s security controls are structured, but the #r00tabaga gives a hacker an effective route into the target’s networks.
Building on the groundwork laid by the MiniPwner and WiFi Pineapple, ACE Hackware’s #r00tabaga MultiPwner combines the best traits of both devices into one exceptionally portable and capable tool. The MiniPwner’s OpenWRT core gives the #r00tabaga all the dropbox tools you’d expect, and the WiFi Pineapple’s automated rogue access point functionality makes setting up a cloned network a hands-free affair.
The #r00tabaga MultiPwner is based on the TPLink MR3040 travel router, a device that’s proven popular in the OpenWRT community thanks to its low cost and built-in battery.
#r00tabaga MultiPwner Hardware Specifications
- CPU: Atheros AR7240 @ 400 MHz
- RAM: 32 MB
- ROM: 4 MB
- OS: OpenWRT
- I/O: Ethernet, USB, Serial
- Radio: Atheros AR9331 802.11 b/g/n
- Storage: USB Flash Drive
#r00tabaga MultiPwner Notable Features
The #r00tabaga operates in two distinct modes, called “MiniPwner” and “Pineapple”, which the operator can switch between by using the “activate minipwner” or “activate pineapple” commands accordingly. Switching modes therefore requires an interactive shell on the device, as well as a reboot to make the switch. This can make mode switching a bit cumbersome in the field.
By default the #r00tabaga operates in MiniPwner mode and creates a WiFi network the operator can connect to for configuration. When switched into Pineapple mode the user connects to the device via the Ethernet port, and the #r00tabaga will start cloning WiFi networks that client devices are looking for. Once clients have connected, the #r00tabaga has access to the full suite of WiFi Pineapple Infusions in addition to the standard penetration testing tools.
Since it’s based on open source projects, the #r00tabaga can be built from the ground up by a user who’s willing to spend the time working on their own TPLink MR3040 hardware.
Combining the MiniPwner and WiFi Pineapple software into one device is a logical evolution of these popular open source penetration testing projects, but the process of switching between them hinders the overall experience. The #r00tabaga is more expensive than either of the products it’s based on, though at only $150 it’s still very affordable. Enabling users and developers to build their own version of the #r00tabaga from the OpenWRT sources offsets the higher cost to a degree, but the lack of clear and concise documentation makes this process more difficult than it could be. |
Lessons From the apt Remote Code Execution Vulnerability
Well, it’s happened before, so it was bound to happen again: a remote code execution bug was found in APT. And it’s particularly interesting in the context of an age-old debate that has been dragging on in Debian-related circles about the use of HTTPS – a question that has been asked often enough that the answer has its own website now.
How bad was it? What is there to learn from this? And what does it tell us about the importance of HTTPS in package management security?
Let’s start with the root cause of this bug, because I think understanding this point is critical to understanding every question that this bug raises.
This bug happened because APT did not validate untrusted input. It is, strictly speaking, a vulnerability in the protocol used to communicate between the “master” APT process and the worker processes that handle downloads.
The critical problem was’t inherently related to HTTP per se (but HTTP was a very convenient attack vector). The real problem was that APT would blindly trust, without verification, the hashes provided by the HTTP fetcher process. This enabled an attacker to effectively eschew the signature verification process and, therefore, to provide a forged package (with the arbitrary code to execute).
What does this have to do with HTTP? Conceptually (but not practically) speaking, the most straightforward way to exploit this would be by compromising the mirror itself. So HTTP wouldn’t have been much of a mitigation, right? You could trigger this bug without it, too.
HTTP is a very convenient vector: if HTTP is used, you no longer need access to the mirror, you just need to in a position where you can intercept HTTP traffic.
For an attacker who wants to target a particular (and security-conscious) target, gaining that privileged position may be as difficult as compromising a legitimate mirror or convincing their target to use a malicious one. But the world is full of opportunistic attackers who could exploit this bug. And, if they aren’t after someone or some network in particular, there are many targets which are far less security-able (or security-conscious) than Debian mirrors and are therefore easier to compromise.
It’s a bit like this: compromising a legitimate Debian mirror is the equivalent of gaining access to the Death Star. This bug is the equivalent of making pint-sized nukes available for 9.99 credits at every shop in the Galaxy. If your objective is to blow up the Imperial Palace on Coruscant, it’s hard to pull it off either way. But the latter option enables every bloke with a grudge to blow up his neighbourhood, and if your objective is to blow up your ex’s speeder, it has the remarkable advantage of not requiring you to take on umpteen squadrons of stormtroopers and Darth Vader himself. (I know you got it the first time but I really wanted to get Star Wars involved here)
Would HTTPS have helped? Definitely. There’s not much to debate here, really — the only mechanism that guaranteed package integrity failed, so having another one that worked would have obviously helped.
But the equation isn’t as simple as that. As far as we know, this bug hasn’t been exploited in the wild. Moving to HTTPS by default (not even HTTPS only) would have been difficult and expensive to orchestrate, but would have protected no one. As far as we know, and up to this point, it would have been the virtual equivalent of Fort Alexander: a sound defense against an attack that never came.
Now, there are three points I want to make about this: one about HTTPS, one about threat models, and one about choosing what tools you trust.
About HTTPS: there’s something we’ve started forgetting about it. With privacy being a growing concern, we are used to treating HTTPS as a privacy-enhancing technology, while forgetting its other useful properties: endpoint authentication and tamper-proof communication.
This bug also raises an interesting point about threat models. This is not merely a matter of defense in depth (which, despite what the armchair developers on /r/linux would have you believe, is a concept that Debian developers are perfectly aware of). It’s a matter of covering the many threat models of an audience as diverse as Debian’s.
When you are writing, say, the backend for an online store, threat models are relatively straightforward to model (note that I haven’t said trivial, so please bear with me). But when you are writing a package management tool, even enumerating the deployment scenarios and the parties interested in compromising each of them is a daunting task.
So at this point, the decade-old mantra of “no threat model, no threat” is something you may want to be flexible about. In principle, it’s true, but for all you know, you may just have forgotten about, or underestimated the importance of, a particular threat. Which is not something to be ashamed of when you have hundreds, if not thousands of other models to consider.
(I don’t know if this is the case, but the Debian wiki, the that-should-settle-it website, and bits and pieces of the code that I’ve read, all give me the impression that threat modelling has focused largely on the mirrors or the upload process getting compromised, with an attacker attempting to supply forged packages at the far end of the connection).
There is also a big difference in threat research difficulty, and this is important when choosing what tools you trust. A Debian mirror exposes its functionality through (mostly) well-audited programs, with a lot of effort put into hardening – the likes of SSH, nginx or Apache, which garner the interest of many people outside the Debian project.
APT, by comparison, is largely a Debian- and Ubuntu-only affair. If someone announced a big bug bounty tomorrow, I’d definitely bet on scary zero-days being found in APT, rather than on someone figuring out an easy way to compromise a server running nothing but sshd and nginx, or figuring out an easy way to MITM an HTTPS connection.
If you’re thinking this is me subtly saying you should stop trusting Debian, I think it suffices to say that I’m writing this from a Debian box. This is a lesson for developers first and foremost. If you’re designing a system that needs to guarantee data integrity, and you can leverage the likes of TLS, which have way more effort put into it than you could ever hope to put into your system, then you should. It might miserably fail Occam’s test, but it might just save you one day.
(Just to make things clear: if you can is system-specific. I don’t know if Debian can.)
Is there a solution to all this? I think there is, and I think it does involve eventually transitioning to a model where HTTPS is used by default (while making it even easier for large site administrators to configure local mirrors). But it’s worth remembering that:
- Signing is still of capital importance, even over HTTPS. This bug would have been equally scary and equally important even if APT had worked only over HTTPS.
- HTTPS is not magic security dust. It comes with its own complications (regarding root CAs, for example); a borked HTTPS deployment can end up as insecure as an HTTP deployment, while looking more trustworthy because it starts with the right magic letters. The current state of affairs might mean that the Debian team feels they are more likely to successfully write a good verification chain than to successfully deploy a network of trustworthy HTTPS mirrors; when you look at it that way, it doesn’t seem to be entirely out of this world.
- HTTPS brings its own challenges in terms of performance, flexibility, and even security. In order for an alternative (we already have apt-transport-https, and it is possible to set up HTTPS mirrors) to be a credible choice for the default option, it needs to have credible answers to all these problems.
- There are many problems that HTTPS doesn’t solve (ironically, in this case, privacy is one of them). Adopting HTTPS won’t “finally” make APT secure, although it will make it more complex.
I have a feeling that these problems are tractable, if only because OpenBSD can do it – admittedly, for a smaller installer base, but also with less funding and a smaller volunteer base.
So, even though I got a scare out of it (and manually verified package checksums for the first time in many, many years), I don’t think this was that gloomy a day. |
A previously unknown threat actor dubbed NewsPenguin has been linked to a phishing campaign targeting Pakistani entities by leveraging the upcoming international maritime expo as a lure.
"The attacker sent out targeted phishing emails with a weaponized document attached that purports to be an exhibitor manual for PIMEC-23," the BlackBerry Research and Intelligence Team said.
PIMEC, short for Pakistan International Maritime Expo and Conference, is an initiative of the Pakistan Navy and is organized by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs with an aim to "jump start development in the maritime sector." It's scheduled to be held from February 10-12, 2023.
The Canadian cybersecurity company said the attacks are designed to target marine-related entities and the event's visitors by tricking the message recipients into opening the seemingly harmless Microsoft Word document.
Once the document is launched and macros are enabled, a method called remote template injection is employed to fetch the next-stage payload from an actor-controlled server that's configured to return the artifact only if the request is sent from an IP address located in Pakistan.
BlackBerry said it found the server to be hosting two ZIP archive files sans any password protections, one of which includes a Windows executable (updates.exe) that functions as a covert spying tool capable of bypassing sandboxes and virtual machines.
Dmitry Bestuzhev, a threat researcher at BlackBerry, told The Hacker News that the backdoor has been written from scratch in a manner that's tailored to this campaign.
"The threat actor behind it made a special effort to fly under the radar by being undetected," Bestuzhev said. "For example, between each request, there is a five minute delay. That's to lessen the risk of being uncovered."
"The implant includes self-deletion commands in case of exposure or when the op is finalized. It also contains commands for data transfer, deleting other files, and executing/running other apps in the victim's system. It looks for files in the system, gathers information about them, and uploads them to the remote server if the files are interesting. It's designed to steal sensitive files on the victim's disk."
What's more, the contents of the binary are encrypted with the XOR encryption algorithm, where the XOR key is "penguin." The HTTP response containing the backdoor also comes with the name parameter in the Content-Disposition response header set to "getlatestnews."
The name NewsPenguin is a reference to the uncommon XOR key and the name parameter, with BlackBerry finding no tactical overlaps that connect the malware to any currently-known threat actor or group.
An analysis of the domain hosting the payloads shows that it has been registered since June 30, 2022, indicating some level of advance planning for the campaign while simultaneously taking steps to iterate its toolset.
"As the target is an event run by the Pakistan Navy, it implies that the threat actor is actively targeting government organizations, rather than this being a financially motivated attack," BlackBerry said.
"It appears that the goal of this campaign is to find and steal the most interesting files containing information about the theme of the conference, people's networking, and technologies presented there," Bestuzhev added. |
Republic of the Philippines
National Police Commission
PHILIPPINE NATIONAL POLICE
Camp BGen Rafael T Crame, Quezon City
ACG-CYBER SECURITY BULLETIN NR 305: Charming Kitten’s PowerStar Backdoor Malware Evolves with Advanced Techniques
Reference Number ACG-CSB ACG-CSB 072723305
The following information was obtained from different cyber security sources for notification to all parties concerned pursuant to the mandate of the Philippine National Police Anti-Cybercrime Group (PNP ACG) and classified as “Restricted” pursuant to the PNP Regulation 200-012 on Document Security and Impact Rating as high based on PNP Information Communication Technology (ICT) Security Manual s.2010-01 p. 22 and p.129.
In recent years, Iranian hackers have become increasingly sophisticated in their cyber-attacks. One of the most dangerous tool in their arsenal is the PowerStar Backdoor malware. This malware is designed to infiltrate critical infrastructure systems and steal sensitive data.
This new version of the malware show how Charming Kitten is always working to improve its strategies and remain undetected. It highlights the need for stringent cybersecurity measures to be implemented to counter these sophisticated threats.
The PowerStar Backdoor malware is a Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that allows hackers to gain unauthorized access to a system and steal sensitive data. The malware is typically delivered via spear-phishing emails or by exploiting vulnerabilities in software. Once the malware infects a system, it creates a backdoor that allows the hacker to remotely control the system. The hacker can then steal sensitive data, install additional malware, or use the system to launch further attacks.
PowerStar variant adds new features such as the ability to remotely execute PowerShell and C# commands, establish persistence via various methods, dynamically update configurations, use multiple Command and Control (C2) channels, and conduct system reconnaissance and monitoring of existing persistence mechanisms.
The PowerStar Backdoor malware is designed to be stealthy and difficult to detect. It uses a variety of techniques to evade detection, including encrypting its communications, using anti-debugging techniques, and hiding its files and processes. The malware is typically delivered via emails that contain a malicious attachment or link. When the user clicks on the attachment or link, the malware is downloaded and installed on their system.
Iranian hackers have been using the PowerStar Backdoor malware to target critical infrastructure systems, including those in the energy, water, and transportation sectors. In one recent attack, Iranian hackers used the PowerStar Backdoor malware to target a water treatment plant in Israel. The hackers were able to gain access to the plant’s control systems and manipulate the water treatment process. Fortunately, the attack was detected before any damage was done.
In conclusion, the PowerStar Backdoor malware is a dangerous tool that is being used by Iranian hackers to target critical infrastructure systems. The malware is designed to be stealthy and difficult to detect, making it a serious threat to organizations that rely on critical infrastructure. To protect against this threat, it is essential to take steps to secure your systems, including keeping your software up-to-date, using strong password combination, and training your employees to recognize and avoid phishing attacks. By taking these steps, you can reduce the risk of falling victim to cyber-attacks and keep your sensitive data safe and secure.
The public is advised to follow these tips to understand the risk of Charming Kitten’s PowerStar Backdoor Malware:
- Run a malware scan;
- Filter Your Email and Implement Anti-Phishing Protection;
- Keep Your Systems Up-To-Date With the Latest Security Patches;
- Encrypt Any Sensitive Company Information You Have;
- Conduct Multi-Factor Authentication;
- Use Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) Technology;
- Run Frequent Backups;
- Conduct Email Security Training for Employees; and
- Be Wary of Suspicious Emails.
For additional information, please refer to the following websites:
POINT OF CONTACT |
According to Webroot Software Inc. there has been an alarming progression of spyware threats over recent months identifying Trojans as Spyware accelerators.
"Our research team reports, that there has been a high level of activity in the area of Trojans", says Vinay Goel, Vice President of Marketing at Webroot, one of the leading developers of anti spyware solutions. "The increase of Trojans has resulted in a significant development in the field of spyware, whereby a single Trojan can act as a dangerous gateway for additional malware to infect a PC".
The spyware-hunters from Webroot regularly compile a list of the most prevalent adware, trojans and system monitors that they encounter and publish them on there website. For the first time in the Top-Ten of Trojans, there`s now Trojan Downloader WStart, which installs itself secretly and regularly downloads additional malware on to the users system.
Webroot have also observed an upsurge in the sophistication and innovation employed by scammers using phishing Trojans, some of which are able to change there appearance sometimes weekly to fool security on PCS. Using these Phishing Trojans, criminals are able to steal user names and passwords, subsequently giving access to the individual's online banking, PayPal and E-bay accounts. |
McAfee researchers announced Thursday that an espionage campaign targeting defense and aerospace contractors using job offers on LinkedIn covered a broader geographic area than previously thought.
The campaign, called Operation North Star, was first reported by McAfee over the summer. The attacks showed similar tactics, techniques and procedures to the North Korean actor Hidden Cobra and targeted South Korean firms. The campaign phished employees by copying job opportunities from legitimate websites and crafting lures that were diligently tailored to the targets.
The new deep-dive from McAfee is based on access to a command and control server used by the campaign. It expands that geographic base to Russia, India, Australia and Israel. It also uncovered a previously unreported second stage implant – "Torisma" – being used in the campaign. But, said McAfee chief scientist Raj Samani, the most interesting new discovery might be the lengths Operation North Star went to protect itself.
"They were very conscious of the operational security," he told SC Media. "If anyone fell outside an allow list opened one of the word files, it would not attack."
If someone forwarded a job opportunity to a friend in need of work, for example, Operation North Star would turn down the easy target.
"This was not an attack of opportunism. This was an attack against specific victims," he said.
As SC Media reported in August, the campaign used malicious documents to install malware on the targeted system using what’s known as a template injection attack. This technique lets a weaponized document download an external Word template containing macros that are later executed. Samani said at the time that bad threat actors use template injection attacks to bypass static malicious document analysis, as well as detection, adding that malicious macros are embedded in the downloaded template.
The campaign itself might be a good teachable example for chief information security officers to use with employees about spear-phishing and social media, said Samani. It's one he's used for trainings.
"Nobody is going to turn to their IT department and say 'I was looking for a new job and opened this file that I think might be a problem,'" said Samani. "CISOs need to show employees they could easily be fooled by fake profiles and that it is not just the office who is a target. You are the target." |
3.3 Netlogon as a Security Support Provider
In addition to other functionality, Netlogon also serves as a limited private SSP<103> for use by Netlogon and RPC ([MS-RPCE] section 126.96.36.199.7) when encrypting and signing data during communication.<104> Central to this capability is the use of the session key, as specified in section 3.1. This section specifies the behavior of the security provider role for both client and server.
Netlogon implements a service that allows the RPC runtime to perform a security context negotiation between the client and the server and to use per-message calls to protect the data being passed over the network. For Netlogon to be able to perform this functionality, a session key MUST have been established between the client and the server as described in section 3.1. Netlogon registers with the RPC runtime as a security provider with the auth_type value (as specified in [MS-RPCE] section 188.8.131.52) of 0x44.
When serving as its own generic SSP, Netlogon always provides the following service features:
Integrity: Signed messages are constructed so that they cannot be tampered with while in transit. The generation and receipt of the Netlogon Signature token will always provide integrity protection for the messages.
Sequence Detect: Signed messages are constructed such that out-of-order sequences can be detected. The generation and receipt of the Netlogon Signature token will always detect out-of-sequence messages. |
LockBit 3.0 leaks 600 GB of stolen data in a ransomware attack
From nation-state hacking groups targeting organizations worldwide to widespread vulnerabilities in commonly used software, and from spear-phishing email campaigns to data leaks in massive ransomware attacks, cyberattacks have had a global impact this week. As a result, security experts are concerned that people’s data security will continue to be jeopardized if organizations fail to strengthen their infrastructure defenses.
SISA Weekly Threat Watch – our weekly feature brings to you a quick snapshot of all the major security vulnerabilities that posed a threat to organizations worldwide. These recurring actionable threat advisories will also provide information and recommendations that will help security teams take appropriate actions to defend against the latest and critical threats.
1. ScarCruft’s latest tactics use LNK files to deliver RokRAT malware
ScarCruft is a North Korean threat group that primarily targets South Korean individuals and entities using spear-phishing attacks to deliver custom malware. ScarCruft has recently adapted its modus operandi to use LNK files and cloud services like Dropbox and Microsoft OneDrive to disguise command-and-control (C2) communications as legitimate. The group is also developing new malware, including SidLevel, which has extensive capabilities to steal sensitive information from victims.
ROKRAT is typically delivered as a malicious Microsoft Office document, often in the form of a spear-phishing email. Once the document is opened and the user enables macros, ROKRAT downloads additional payloads and executes its main functionality. To avoid being a victim of such attacks, it is recommended to keep operating system and software up to date, use strong passwords for all accounts, and enable two-factor authentication wherever possible. Additionally, monitor the network traffic for unusual activity and implement intrusion detection and prevention systems.
2. XSS flaw found in WordPress plugin with more than 2 million installations
Security researchers have warned that the ‘Advanced Custom Fields’ and ‘Advanced Custom Fields Pro’ WordPress plugins, with millions of installs, are vulnerable to reflected cross-site scripting attacks (XSS). The flaw allows any unauthenticated user from stealing sensitive information to privilege escalation on the WordPress site by tricking a privileged user to visit the crafted URL path. Reflected XSS attacks usually occur when victims are tricked into clicking on a bogus link sent via email or another route, causing the malicious code to be sent to the vulnerable website, which reflects the attack back to the user’s browser.
It’s worth noting that the vulnerability can be activated on a default installation or configuration of Advanced Custom Fields, although it’s only possible to do so from logged-in users who have access to the plugin. Users of Advanced Custom Fields plugin for WordPress are strongly advised to update to version 6.1.6 to safeguard their websites from this XSS vulnerability.
3. Fullerton India hacked, LockBit 3.0 leaks 600 GB of data
Fullerton India Credit Company, or shortly Fullerton India, a large lending institution from India, appears to be hacked back in early April 2023. It is confirmed by the LockBit ransomware Darknet blog, where hackers listed the company, and now, over a month later, published all the leaked information. Affiliates deploying LockBit 3.0 ransomware gain initial access to victim networks via remote desktop protocol (RDP) exploitation, drive-by compromise, phishing campaigns, abuse of valid accounts, and exploitation of public-facing applications.
LockBit has mentioned that those stolen data are loan agreements with individuals and legal companies, customer status and organizational accounts, agreements with financial institutions, data on international transfers, financial documents, mail correspondence on important transactions with attachments, customers’ personal information, and more. To avoid data loss due to such attacks, it is recommended to implement a recovery plan to maintain and retain multiple copies of sensitive or proprietary data and servers in a secure location. To prevent the spread of ransomware, identify, detect, and investigate abnormal activity and potential traversal of the indicated ransomware with a network monitoring tool.
4. SideCopy uses Action RAT and AllaKore RAT to infiltrate Indian organizations
SideCopy, a suspected Pakistan-aligned threat actor, has been observed leveraging themes related to the Indian military research organization as part of an ongoing phishing campaign. This involves the use of a ZIP archive lure, pertaining to India’s Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO), to deliver a malicious payload capable of harvesting sensitive information. Intriguingly, the same attack chains have been observed to load and execute Action RAT as well as an open source remote access trojan known as AllaKore RAT.
Analysis of the Action RAT command-and-control (C2) infrastructure has identified outbound connections from one of the C2 server IP addresses to another address, which is geolocated in Pakistan. Collectively, as many as 18 distinct victims in India have been detected as connecting to C2 servers associated with Action RAT and 236 unique victims, again located in India, connecting to C2 servers associated with AllaKore RAT. It is recommended to avoid downloading attachments from untrusted sources, keep all the systems updated, and use strong encryption and key management to protect sensitive information from being misused.
5. Kimsuky hackers expand targeting scope with advanced reconnaissance tool
The Kimsuky hacking group from North Korea has been using a new version of its reconnaissance malware named ‘ReconShark’ in a worldwide cyberespionage campaign. The emails are designed to contain a link to a password-protected document hosted on Microsoft OneDrive, which helps reduce the likelihood of detection by email security tools. Once the target downloads the document and enables macros, as instructed, the embedded ReconShark malware is activated.
ReconShark is capable of using Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to gather data on the infected system, including running processes and battery status. It then sends the collected information directly to the C2 server via HTTP POST requests, avoiding local storage. ReconShark can also fetch additional payloads from the C2 server, which further strengthens Kimsuky’s foothold on the compromised system. To safeguard against these attacks, organizations must educate employees on cybersecurity best practices, deploy, and regularly update anti-malware and intrusion detection software, and limit administrative privileges.
To get daily updates on the critical vulnerabilities being exploited by threat actors, subscribe to SISA Daily Threat Watch – our daily actionable threat advisories.
For a deeper understanding of how you can prevent these threats from affecting your organization, request a call to get in touch with our experts. |
Hardening security configurations
There are several methods that we can use to protect the WAS infrastructure and applications from different forms of attack. Several different techniques can help with multiple forms of attack. Sometimes a single attack can leverage multiple forms of intrusion to achieve the end goal.
For example, in the simplest case, network sniffing can be used to obtain passwords and those passwords can then be used to mount an application-level attack.
The following issues are discussed in IBM WebSphere Developer Technical Journal: WAS V5 advanced security and system hardening:
- Take preventative measures to protect the infrastructure.
- Make applications less vulnerable to attack.
- At a minimum, ensure administrative security is enabled in all WebSphere processes. This protects access to the admin ConfigService interface and managed beans (MBeans) that enables control over the WebSphere process if it is compromised.
- Ensure SSL is used whenever possible, and mutual SSL whenever possible. However, mutual SSL requires all clients to supply a trusted personal certificate in order to connect.
- Remove any unnecessary CA signer certificates from the trust stores.
- Change default keystore passwords during or after profile creation using AdminTask changeMultipleKeyStorePasswords command.
- Change the LTPA keys periodically. By default, this occurs automatically every 12 weeks. To disable this automatic regeneration, remember to manually generate a new set of keys on occasion.
- Common Secure Interoperability version 2 (CSIv2) inbound Basic authentication is supported in this release of WAS. This means that the authentication process is optional. Consider changing the authentication default to 'required'.
Tuning, hardening, and maintaining security configurations |
Web traffic - module for intercepting network traffic using HTTP/HTTPS protocols. The agent intercepts and records all network activity of applications, including encrypted channels (SSL/TLS). This module is necessary for intercepting the history of visiting web pages and for generating reports on time tracking.
Web search queries - module for tracking queries in search engines (Rambler, Google, Yandex).
Web forms interception - module that allows you to intercept post requests from web pages in the browser. Used to intercept passwords of web resources using the security policy “Passwords from browsers”
To view events associated with passwords interception in web browsers open “Triggered filters - Passwords from browsers”
Rules: Web - Reporting for content type.¶
Disallow - forbid collecting data on the chosen content types.
Allow - allow collecting data only for the chosen content types.
Rules: Access - Sites¶
Block - block websites by domain address.
Allow - list of the web-sites allowed for visiting, stated as domain name.
If specify allowed web-sites, all other web-sites will be locked!
Rules: Web forms¶
Disallow - forbid tracking web form data from the specified domains or URL.
Allow - allow tracking web form data only from the specified domains or URL. |
An ATM skimmer is a small device used by identity thieves to steal a victim’s debit and/or credit card numbers.
ATM card skimmers can be installed over an ATM’s card reader slot. When a victim unknowingly inserts his or her card, the skimmer device obtains the data. An identity thief can also attach a small camera somewhere on the ATM in order to see the victim’s PIN number as it’s keyed in.
Another type of skimmer is a keypad device that identity thieves will place over the ATM’s normal keypad. This overlay device can record and store the PIN numbers that are entered. Some advanced versions send the stolen information to the identity thief immediately via text message.
Variations on skimmers
Skimmers are used to do more than steal numbers at ATMs. They are also commonly employed by identity thieves in settings where the victim hands over a card during a business transaction.
For instance, a waitress could use a skimmer to steal a customer’s credit card number once she has taken it away to pay the bill. Skimmers are also sometimes used by bartenders, who can discreetly swipe the card through an illegal skimmer behind the bar before handing it back to the customer.
Protecting yourself from ATM skimmers
Unfortunately, you may not immediately realize if your identity has been compromised because of a skimmer. The ATM may still look normal and operate as it usually does.
In order to protect yourself from skimmers and other tools used in bank scams, you may want to learn more about how identity theft protection companies can help you. |
Just as there has been a spate of hugely problematic updates for Windows 10 over the last year, in recent weeks there has been a seemingly endless stream of security flaws relating to the Windows print spooler. Now Microsoft has acknowledged another zero-day vulnerability.
There is currently no fix available for the security bug, a Remote Code Execution vulnerability which is being tracked as CVE-2021-36958. However, Microsoft has offered up a (less than ideal) workaround for this latest vulnerability from the PrintNightmare family.
Security researcher Benjamin Delpy recently shared a Proof of Concept on Twitter, and Microsoft has confirmed that CVE-2021-36958 relates to this. The security vulnerability has a CVSS score of 7.3, and there is some confusion about why it has been classed as remote code execution flaw when local access is required to exploit it.
Microsoft says of the flaw:
A remote code execution vulnerability exists when the Windows Print Spooler service improperly performs privileged file operations. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could run arbitrary code with SYSTEM privileges. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.
As has been the case with previous related bugs, there is a workaround, but it is one that is less than ideal for many people — stopping and disabling the Print Spooler service.
Microsoft shares details of the steps people need to take:
Determine if the Print Spooler service is running
Run the following in Windows PowerShell:
Get-Service -Name Spooler
If the Print Spooler is running or if the service is not disabled, follow these steps:
Stop and disable the Print Spooler service
If stopping and disabling the Print Spooler service is appropriate for your environment, run the following in Windows PowerShell:
Stop-Service -Name Spooler -Force
Set-Service -Name Spooler -StartupType Disabled
Impact of workaround Stopping and disabling the Print Spooler service disables the ability to print both locally and remotely.
Image credit: Sundry Photography / Shutterstock |
This attack could pose a serious security threat. You should take immediate action to stop any damage or prevent further damage from happening.
This signature detects attempts to exploit a security bypass vulnerability in Apache Tomcat.
Apache Tomcat is prone to a remote code-execution vulnerability. Specifically, this issue occur when HTTP PUT method enabled. Successful exploits may allow an attackers to upload a JSP file to the server using a specially crafted request.
Successfully exploiting this issue allows attackers to execute arbitrary code in the context of the affected application.
Apache Tomcat 7.0.81 and prior versions are vulnerable.
NOTE: This issue is the result of an incomplete fix for the issue described in BID 100901 (Apache Tomcat CVE-2017-12615 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability).
- Apache Tomcat 7.0.81 and prior versions are vulnerable. |
When exposed to the Internet or to untrusted networks, the web UI feature of Cisco IOS XE Software has a vulnerability [CVE-2023-20198] that allows a remote, unauthenticated attacker to create an account on an affected system with privilege level 15 access. The attacker can then use that account to gain control of the affected system.
See the resource center.
- Cisco has released a fix for version 17.9.4a. All prior versions are considered vulnerable if the HTTP service is exposed. Refer to the Recommendations section of the Cisco advisory for updates on the status of their investigation and when a software patch is available.
- The Bitsight Vulnerability Research team expects to be able to produce a “suspected exposure” capability for this vulnerability. The timeline is currently unknown as the capability is currently being evaluated. |
What would you say if we told you that your version of Windows is affected by a vulnerability that dates back to 1997? You’d laugh, right? Surely, after all, Microsoft would have patched the fault prior to releasing Windows 98, or at the latest, Windows 2000?
Well, not quite.
This Redirect to SMB vulnerability has its roots in the identically-named attack discovered by Aaron Spangler 18 years ago. And it’s a problem that you need to do something about, because it doesn’t only affect Windows, but also programs from Adobe, Apple, Symantec and even the Windows 10 preview.
Redirect to SMB: What Does it Do?
Affecting Windows PCs, tablets and servers, Redirect to SMB – discovered by Cylance’s Brian Wallace – is a development of the original vulnerability.
In 1997, Spangler found that introducing URLS beginning “file” would cause Windows to attempt authentication with an SMB server at the given IP address (for example, file://126.96.36.199), which could then be used to record login credentials. These URLs could be introduced as images, iframes, or any other media displayed by the browser.
SMB is the Server Message Block protocol, mostly used for sharing files, printers, and serial ports on a network. Various versions have been released over the years, (Samba is an open source implementation, although there is no suggestion that the vulnerability exists there) and it has long been a target, with real-time scanning demonstrating that SMB is one of the most popular attack vectors for online intruders. It was reported in December that the Sony Pictures hack was performed using an SMB vulnerability.
Redirect to SMB was uncovered by the Cylance team as they investigated ways to abuse a chat client.
“When a URL to an image was received, the client attempted to show a preview of the image. Inspired by Aaron’s research some 18 years ago, we promptly sent another user a URL starting with file:// which pointed to a malicious SMB server. Surely enough, the chat client tried to load the image, and the Windows user at the other end attempted to authenticate with our SMB server.
“We created an HTTP server in Python that answered every request with a simple HTTP 302 status code to redirect clients to a file:// URL, and using that we were able to confirm that an http:// URL could lead to an authentication attempt from the OS.”
It doesn’t take much to prompt someone to enter their credentials, after all – just a legitimate-looking dialogue box.
How Redirect to SMB Might Be Used Against You
Four Windows API functions can be used to redirect a HTTP or HTTPS connection to an SMB connection, where a malicious server may await to siphon away user credentials, and reuse them for nefarious purposes.
Brian Wallace explains that for Redirect to SMB to be successful, the attacker must be reasonably advanced as there is a requirement to “control… some component of a victim’s network traffic.”
He also points out that the threats can come in the shape of malicious adverts forcing authentication attempts, and Redirect to SMB can also be used in a drive by hack on public Wi-Fi networks (dangerous at the best of times), launched from a portable computer, and even an Android smartphone.
Potentially one of the most dangerous attack vectors unleashed by Redirect to SMB is via Apple’s iTunes Software Updater. In this scenario, a compromised DNS record could lead to redirect updates being directed to an SMB server, again with the result that credentials are farmed via a classic Man-In-The-Middle attack.
Put simply, this is a vulnerability that should have been closed 18 years ago. While Microsoft offered ways to mitigate it then, the opposition – the black hats – have become far more sophisticated in their attacks, with more and more Internet users representing a big pay day. Now would seem to be the time for Microsoft to get its act together on SMB security.
Software Affected by Re-Direct to SMB
Okay, it’s deep breath time. As well as every version of Windows the mid-1990s, Redirect to SMB also affects a wide selection of applications and system utilities (at least 31) from some of the biggest names in the industry. To begin, Microsoft and Apple.
- Internet Explorer 11
- Windows Media Player
- Excel 2010
- Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer
- Apple iTunes Software Update
Frustratingly for a vulnerability of this kind, security software is also affected.
- Symantec Norton Security Scan
- AVG Free
- BitDefender Free
- Comodo Antivirus
Productivity apps that are known to be vulnerable to Redirect to SMB:
- Adobe Reader
- Box Sync (the Box.net cloud client app)
These utilities and installers are also affected:
- .NET Reflector
- Maltego CE
- GitHub for Windows
- IntelliJ IDEA
- PHP Storm
- Oracle JDK 8u31’s installer
As you can see, this is quite a list, with every application a potential gateway to your credentials for an attacker. But what can you do about it?
Workaround, or Wait for a Patch?
Microsoft is said to be working on a patch to fix the Redirect to SMB vulnerability. But until that happens, what can you do?
As reported by cybersecurity experts Cylance, the best fix is to block traffic sent outbound from your computer through your software firewall or through your router, on TCP 139 and TCP 445. This will block SMB communication between your network and the Internet, and if the change is made on the network firewall, you will still be able to use SMB between devices on your local network. Our guide to the Windows Firewall explains how to create these rules in just a few seconds; for your router, you’ll need to check the device documentation.
Given the breadth of operating systems and applications affected by this vulnerability, and with the impending arrival of Windows 10, isn’t it about time Microsoft did something about it?
Image Credits: Password via Shutterstock |
Netgear recently informed customers that it has released firmware updates for some of its routers and switches to address remote code execution and other types of vulnerabilities.
Netgear announced the launch of a bug bounty program in early January and the company has been regularly publishing security advisories and notifications over the past months. The firm has been offering between $150 and $15,000 for responsibly disclosed vulnerabilities, and it already claims to have rewarded more than 150 bug reports.
In the most recent advisories, Netgear informed users about the existence of CVE-2017-6862, a buffer overflow vulnerability that can be exploited by a remote attacker to bypass authentication and execute arbitrary commands.
The flaw, discovered by Maxime Peterlin of ON-X, affects WNR2000v3, WNR2000v4, WNR2000v5 and R2000 routers. Firmware updates that patch the vulnerability are available for all impacted models.
Netgear said the weakness can only be exploited by an attacker with access to the network hosting the device, or if the router has the remote management feature enabled. This feature is disabled by default.
A different advisory describes a vulnerability affecting some of the company’s smart and managed switches. The flaw allows an unauthenticated attacker to access a debugging URL from where they can execute arbitrary commands, including for resetting and rebooting the switch.
An attack can be launched remotely if the switch is remotely accessible, but Netgear believes most users have firewalls in place that should prevent exploitation.
The security hole affects nearly three dozen switches, including FS, GS, M, S and XS models. Firmware updates that patch the flaw are available for most of the impacted devices.
Another recent advisory warns users of a vulnerability affecting CM700 high speed cable modems. The bug does not pose any risk to data, but it can allow an attacker to disrupt a targeted user’s network connection. No workarounds or patches are available. |
Hackers can even use the vulnerabilities in the ShareIt app to download and steal files from your phone as the cybersecurity firm believes that the vulnerabilities can potentially lead to Remote Code Execution (RCE). “While the app allows the transfer and download of various file types, such as Android Package (APK), the vulnerabilities related to these features are most likely unintended flaws,” it added.
Trend Micro has already informed Google about the same, however, Google is yet to take any action against the app on Play Store.
The app has over 1 billion users and was one of the most downloaded apps in 2019. The Indian government had banned ShareIt along with TikTok and 57 other apps of Chinese origin in November 2020. So, uninstalling the app for India-based ShareIt users makes more sense, as the app may be an open invitation to malware. Alternatives to ShareIt include AirDrop for iPhones, Wi-Fi Direct on your Android phone, Files Go and others.
Trend Micro said that it reported the issues to ShareIt but did not receive any response. “We decided to disclose our research three months after reporting this since many users might be affected by this attack because the attacker can steal sensitive data and do anything with the apps’ permission. It is also not easily detectable,” it warned. |
What if I told you that there exists a set of predictable, repeatable vulnerabilities which is shared by most every customer that I work with? What if I told you that, unless you’ve taken careful, specific steps to mitigate these vulnerabilities*, your organization is also very much at risk.
Generally speaking, these vulnerabilities fall under the rubric of credential theft and reuse. And today I’d like to dive deeper into one such widespread vulnerability: Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) security misconfiguration. We need to talk about it, and you need to do something about it. And Project VAST can help.
Hey there, it’s Jon again, with this month’s installment about Project VAST (the Visual Auditing Security Tool).
Quick Review: What is LDAP
LDAP (an X.500 derivative) is a protocol for data exchange between clients and data stores like Active Directory (AD). Clients bind (or authenticate) against a Domain Controller (DC), run a query to ask for a certain data set, and then receive the data set back from the DC. An example of this exchange might be something like this: Client1 binds against DC1 and asks for the multivalued attribute value member for an object with the displayName of zookeeper. In lay terms, the application, person, or script running the query just asked for the name of all members of an organization’s group zookeepers in the directory. (AD uses LDAP for all sorts of internal calls as well.)
Simple enough, right? Well, not so fast.
What’s the problem?
The problem is with how the client asks for the data. Specifically, in how it binds to the DC. Unless you’ve configured the DC to require signing, many clients are returning unsigned traffic, which is susceptible to replay or attacker-in-the-middle attacks. This may result in nefarious activity, such as modified packets, in which a server or even a person makes decisions based on forged data.
Let’s have a look at a simple network cap below. See anything? Yup, we’ve exposed potentially sensitive data to an attacker, or anyone else with a sniffer.
Let’s look a bit deeper and examine the binds themselves. They’re similarly not secure. Turning back to our simple network cap, we can see the credentials being asserted in the simple LDAP bind.
(For clarity, this is not an AD problem. It’s a problem of LDAP and specifically of LDAP implementations.) Even more concerning, many organizations are exposing their highly-privileged authentication principals' credentials – such as the ones for those that belong to the Domain Admins group. With a simple network cap, an attacker can capture these credentials and achieve an escalation path or even a domain dominance type scenario.
Don’t despair – yes, you are probably vulnerable and yes, you have work to do. But with some help from Project VAST, you can mitigate this scenario.
What to do about insecure LDAP?
Well, the first order of business is to verify that you indeed do have this vulnerability. We’ll do this by checking first for the existence of Event 2887 in the Directory Service log. If you find this event (and you probably will), it means you have had, in the last 24 hours, a client attempt to bind with either a SASL (non-signed) bind or a simple bind over a clear-text connection. At the same time, the existence of 2887 tells us that the directory service is not currently configured to reject such binds. In other words, we have verified the vulnerability exists in the directory.
An example of an Event ID 2887
At this point, we know we have an insecure LDAP configuration and we have clients leveraging it insecurely. But we haven’t yet discovered the source – we don’t know where to take action on the client side. (We could simply start requiring LDAP signing on the DCs, but that would cause the DCs to reject these binds. That would probably not end well. 😊 ) For this, we’ll need to configure some auditing in order to gain a bit more information in the form of Event ID 2889
In order to capture this event, we need to make a registry change on each of our DCs. We’ll target HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\NTDS\Diagnostics /v "16 LDAP Interface Events" with a DWORD value of “2.”
If you have more than a handful of DCs, you’ll probably want to use Group Policy Preferences to set this registry value on each of your DCs. (This can be a very verbose log. You may need to increase the size limit of your log, and certainly turn it off when you’re finished.)
For our project, 2889 is a high-value event, in that it tells us some pretty granular information about the sources of insecure LDAP: The following client performed a SASL (Negotiate/Kerberos/NTLM/Digest) LDAP bind without requesting signing (integrity verification), or performed a simple bind over a cleartext (non-SSL/TLS-encrypted) LDAP connection.
By closely examining this example event 2889, we can see that account svc4 has actually performed an unsigned SASL or clear-text bind from IP address 192.168.2.67. Also, pay attention to the value called Binding Type. The value of 1 in the example tells us that svc4 performed a simple bind; a value of 0 would indicate an unsigned SASL bind.
Do you see the challenge here? In order to enforce signing on our DCs, we need to first remediate insecure binds (or else we’ll break the applications that rely on them). Look closely at the picture above. This log file represents one bind out of 6,771 during a 13-day period from one DC in my lab.
You could use Windows Event Forwarding or a SIEM to aggregate the log files. If you are able to accomplish mitigation of insecure LDAP using these technologies, then you should use them. (You should also share how you were able to accomplish this.) In my experience, aggregation simply isn’t enough. Assuming for a second that the DC above is representative and that my organization has 10 DCs, I have something in the neighborhood of 60,000 logs to sift through. That’s simply not realistic on its own. What we have here is a problem of big data.
Enter Project VAST
This is one of the charters for Project VAST: to make big data sets in the form of audit logs actionable and realistically usable for security mitigation activities. As I discussed in a previous blog entry, we’ll use the relatively new technologies of Azure Log Analytics and Power BI to get a handle on our data here. Using the Microsoft Monitoring Agent (MMA) and some Azure configuration, we’ll pump all of our 2889 events into Azure Log Analytics. Once the data has arrived (typically a delay of a few minutes), we can view and begin controlling the output with a Kusto query in Azure.
That’s better, but it’s not really truly actionable yet. After all, this data set of seven days and two domain controllers contains 9,258 event records.
The real goal here is to leverage the rich visualizations that we’ve come to know and love in Power BI in order to represent the data in a truly actionable format. This allows us to make logical decisions about how we present the data. More importantly, it allows data consumers to make rational, data-centric decisions and to act upon their data.
A Closer Look
Now that we’ve covered the vulnerability and the problem in taking action, let’s have a closer look at Project VAST’s Insecure LDAP tab.
The first thing to notice here is the general look and feel. In the coming months and blog entries, I hope that this interface will become familiar to you. Let’s start in the upper left-hand corner and move through the tab clockwise. (As in the past, a few details have been obfuscated to protect the innocent. 😊)
In the upper left, you’ll see the data flow. This visualizer is mapping the flow of client to DC data. Here, we see a large amount of insecure LDAP traffic coming from two clients and against two DCs. (Recall that the data source here is 2889; in a normal production environment, the data flow may be more complex, so we’re limiting the view to the Top 5 clients.) Right off the bat, we’ve got a few IPs with which to begin our detective work.
To the right of the data flow are some slicers: source IP and destination DC. These will be useful once we’ve decided upon the specific LDAP workflows that we need to research. To the right of Destination DC is a critical filter called isAdmin. This is just what it sounds like. Because VAST does a limited set of queries against AD, we can determine what accounts constitute Administrative accounts; we can (and should) pay special attention to these high-value, high-risk accounts.
This brings us to Insecure LDAP by Account. This is actually where we tend to start our research with customers. The first thing you’ll notice is that some data bars are red and others are yellow. This is because red bars delineate that these are Administrative accounts. (By Administrative accounts, we mean that these accounts have an adminCount value of 1; they are or have been members of a group protected by AdminSDHolder.) By clicking on one (let’s say svc1 in the example above), we can filter all other traffic out and focus solely on this account’s insecure LDAP traffic. By doing this, we’re taking a problem that might seem overwhelming and tackling it in bite-size chunks. This allows us to really dig down into the data to understand where it’s coming from – if necessary, we can look to a raw(er) view of the data (lower right-hand corner) and also delve into the date and time stamps from the 2889s with our final slicer in the lower left-hand corner.
Once we have discovered the source of our insecure LDAP traffic, we’ll work with application owners, developers, and vendors to move to signed and/or encrypted LDAP. Ideally, we’ll also work with decision-makers in our environment to set a date for insecure LDAP to be turned off. We’ll do this so that once the project is complete and we see no more LDAP binds (e.g. we’ve established a KPI of zero insecure LDAP binds), we can disable insecure LDAP on the DCs. That way, new LDAP calls that appear in the environment won’t be able to use insecure or unsigned implementations.
A small point of clarity
After my last blog post, a few folks asked some questions around Project VAST. Specifically, folks wanted to know how they could implement Project VAST in their environment. At present, the only way to implement Project VAST is through Microsoft Premier services, as Project VAST is a Premier Field Engineer (PFE)-designed service. If you’re interested, please contact your TAM or Account Team. (If your organization is not yet a Microsoft Premier customer, please click here.) In the future, the project may become open source or may even integrate into one of our Azure Security products. Stay tuned!
Until then, happy auditing.
*For a broader discussion of credential theft mitigation, please browse the Securing Privileged Access (SPA) roadmap at https://aka.ms/privsec. |
Source: The Register
by John Leyden
In this article “Security watchers have discovered a worm that targets drawings created in AutoCAD software for computer-aided design (CAD).
Tens of thousands of drawings have been swiped using the malware, which is likely to have been designed for industrial espionage, according to antivirus firm Eset. The worm, dubbed ACAD/Medre.A, steals files and sends them to email accounts located in China. ESET said it had worked with Chinese ISP Tencent, the Chinese National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center and Autodesk – the creator of AutoCAD – to stop the harvesting of drawings by blocking email accounts associated with relaying stolen data. Business users in Peru were the main victims of the attack.” |
Pipedream is a malware framework that targets programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and industrial control systems (ICS). First made public in April 2022, this malware toolkit – though there is no known instance of its deployment to date – targets ICS, such as electricity grids, industries, water utilities, and oil refineries. Wary of the malware toolkit’s threat potential, the US government issued an advisory, urging enterprises to look out for it.
Touted as the “Swiss Army knife” for hackers, cybersecurity experts claim the toolkit is the creation of Chernovite Activity Group. Ever since its discovery, Pipedream has drawn comparisons to the Industroyer toolset, which was used in the Ukraine power system cyberattack in December 2015. This modular toolkit enables attackers with access to operational technology (OT) network to monitor, compromise, and operate particular ICS/SCADA devices, such as:
Schneider Electric PLCs,
OMRON Sysmac NEX PLCs, and
Open Platform Communications Unified Architecture (OPC UA) servers.
How can cybercriminals leverage this malware toolkit?
Cybercriminals can launch highly automated exploits against select devices due to the modular architecture of the toolkit. In addition, the software includes a virtual console, which simulates the interface of the targeted ICS/SCADA system. Cyber attackers with lower skills, too, can replicate the capabilities of seasoned hackers by using modules to interact with the targeted devices.
Advanced persistent threat (APT) actors can scan for targeted devices, gather device details, upload malicious software files, and manipulate device parameters using these modules. APT actors can also employ AsrDrv103.sys, a malware that installs and exploits a known-vulnerable ASRock-signed motherboard driver, to execute malicious code in the Windows kernel to exploit CVE-2020-15368. APT actors may also be able to move laterally inside an IT or OT environment and disrupt important devices or functions if this malware toolkit is successfully deployed.
The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the US National Security Agency, and the FBI recently issued a joint notice warning that the Pipedream malware toolkit may interfere with a wide range of industrial control system components. The malware includes more features designed to disrupt or take control of device functionality than any previous industrial control system hacking toolkit. This malware toolkit specifically targets PLCs sold by Schneider Electric and OMRON – both domain leaders. These PLCs are designed to serve as the interface between traditional computers and actuators and sensors in industrial settings.
In an alert co-authored by researchers from several tech giants, the experts claimed that Pipedream could 'execute 38% of known attack techniques and claimed it could pull off 83% of known ICS attack tactics’.
Adding to the widespread concern is the possibility of Chernovite including new modules and plug-ins that will allow attackers to target more devices. As it is, an existing plug-in enables attackers to manipulate small motors known as servos on EtherCAT networks. By modifying pressure control valves, servos can, among other things, regulate natural gas flow in pipelines. Mousehole, another Pipedream tool, enables attackers to influence Open Platform Communications Unified Architecture or OPC UA, and servers facilitating data exchanges.
Companies can start mitigating the Pipedream threat by continuously monitoring Schneider and Omron devices, disabling specific functionalities, and monitoring PLCs for new connections. Businesses should also follow best practices for securing operational technology networks and ensuring they are ready to respond to attacks. This includes developing and practicing incident response procedures. Given the threat potential of Pipedream, relying on the mere network edge and perimeter security may prove inadequate. Monitoring ICS to tackle the expanding attack surface is another way out. Lastly, finding high-quality firmware and controller configuration files can help strengthen the OT environment.
One way of ensuring your company is safe from Pipedream is by testing the quality of your security infrastructure. Remember, the Pipedream malware toolkit can only be deployed after a hacker has made a breach.
Packetlabs is an industry leader in network and system security testing. We offer a wide range of services that can help you identify any vulnerabilities in your networks and systems, and our team of experts can help you mitigate the risks posed by the Pipedream malware toolkit. Contact us today to learn more about our services or to schedule a consultation. |
ADVISORY: ITS IA Advisory: Log4j
Wednesday, February 22, 2023
A zero-day exploit that was originally communicated through an IA Alert on December 10, 2021 is affecting the Apache Log4j utility that could result in remote code execution. This remains an active threat.
US healthcare organizations, including those in the public health sector, are being targeted again by threat actors looking to exploit this zero day vulnerability. If you have not done so, update Log4j to version 2.17 as soon as possible to disable the vulnerable features of log4j.
Log4j is a Java-based logging library maintained by the Apache Software Foundation. According to the Cloudflare Blog, “In the affected Log4j versions, Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) features used in configuration, log messages, and parameters can be exploited by an attacker to perform remote code execution. Specifically, an attacker who can control log messages or log message parameters can execute arbitrary code loaded from LDAP servers when message lookup substitution is enabled.”
Exploit code is publicly available, widespread scanning for vulnerable systems is occurring, and this vulnerability is being exploited actively in the wild.
Apache Log4j 2.0-beta9 up to 2.16.0
- Update to version 2.17.0 Apache Log4j or later after appropriate testing
- Log4J is embedded in a large number of commercial software applications. Be aware of any vendor updates for these packages and apply patches as quickly as possible.
For details, see Apache Log4j Security Vulnerabilities.
How We Protect U-M
- The impacted systems are identified through the Tenable vulnerability scanning agent. We encourage you to work with IA to deploy the Tenable agent to all of your systems. The Tenable agent provides significantly more efficient, accurate, and complete vulnerability scanning results than can be provided with remote network scanning. Submit a ticket to the ITS Service Center with attention to ITS-IAPROACTIVE-Security to begin deployment of the Tenable agent on your unit’s systems.
- ITS provides CrowdStrike Falcon to units, which should be installed on all U-M owned systems (Windows, macOS, and Linux operating systems, whether workstations or servers). Falcon administrators in ITS and in U-M units use the Falcon console to investigate and remediate issues.
Information for Users
In general, the best protection for your devices is this: keep your software and apps up-to-date, do not click suspicious links in email, do not open shared documents or email attachments unless you are expecting them and trust the person who sent them, and only use secure, trusted networks. For more information, see Phishing & Suspicious Email, Secure Your Devices, and Secure Your Internet Connection on the U-M Safe Computing website.
Questions, Concerns, Reports
Please contact ITS Information Assurance through the ITS Service Center.
- Healthcare in the Crosshairs of North Korean Cyber Operations, Dark Reading 2/13/23
- Upgraded to log4j 2.16? Surprise, there's a 2.17 fixing DoS, Bleepingcomputer, 12/18/21
- Log4Shell Update: Severity Upgraded 3.7 -> 9.0 for Second log4j Vulnerability, LunaSec, 12/17/21
- Apache Log4j Security Vulnerabilities, Logging Services
- Apache Log4j Vulnerability Guidance, Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agent (CISA)
- Download Apache Log4j 2, Log4j, 12/6/21
- Apache Log4j Security Vulnerabilities, Log4j, 12/6/21
- CVE-2021-44228, Mitre Corporation, 11/26/21
- The Log4j security flaw could impact the entire internet. Here's what you should know, CNN, 12/15/21
- 1.x end of life, Logging Services
- Security warning: New zero-day in the Log4j Java library is already being exploited, ZDNet, 12/10/21
- Zero-day in ubiquitous Log4j tool poses a grave threat to the Internet, Ars Technica, 12/10/21
- New zero-day exploit for Log4j Java library is an enterprise nightmare, Bleeping Computer, 12/10/21
- CVE-2021-44228 - Log4j RCE 0-day mitigation, Cloudflare Blog, 12/10/21
- RCE in log4j, Log4Shell, or how things can get bad quickly, Internet Storm Center, 12/10/21 |
Two critical vulnerabilities recently patched by IBM in its product WebSphere Application Server can be exploited to execute arbitrary code with elevated privileges by a remote, unauthenticated attacker.
A security researcher who uses the online pseudonym tint0 discovered in April that three potentially severe deserialization issues affect WebSphere Application Server, the Java EE-based runtime environment at IBM. Two of the vulnerabilities have been rated critical and can be exploited for remote code execution, while the third has been rated high severity and can result in disclosure of details.
Tint0 reported the issues to IBM through the Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) of Trend Micro which published advisories for each of the vulnerabilities last week. IBM reported the bugs mid-April.
The security holes that allow remote code execution are tracked as CVE-2020-4450 and CVE-2020-4448, and are caused by “lack of proper validation of user-supplied data, which may lead to deserialization of untrusted information.”
One of the vulnerabilities is related to the BroadcastMessageManager class, allowing arbitrary code execution with SYSTEM privileges, while the other is related to IIOP protocol handling, and allowing root privileged code execution.
The manipulation, according to IBM, involves sending a specially crafted series of serialized objects. WebSphere Application Server 8.5 and 9.0 are affected, and WebSphere Virtual Enterprise Version is affected by CVE-2020-4448 too.
The high-severity flaw identified by tint0 is also related to deserialization of IIOP, and may result in disclosure of information. A remote attacker can use a specially crafted sequence of serialised objects to exploit the vulnerability without authentication.
The vendor has released patches for each of the vulnerabilities, and there is no evidence of malicious exploitation. |
Do-it-yourself wiretapping is not a theoretical figment of the imagination of a bored radio amateur. This is a completely reliable, efficient and inexpensive solution, which can lead to quite tangible consequences. More and more often in our practice we are faced with devices for wiretapping of premises, assembled in a handicraft way.
Another find of the IAC “Living Space” specialists was located in a residential building. An inexpensive model of a used mobile phone, a pre-installed program and a remote microphone are all that cybercriminals needed to organize listening. The device was placed behind the decorative panel of the heating radiator. The availability of the premises for a wide range of people allowed to periodically replace the battery as it was discharged. |
Recent research reveals that deliberately crafted adversarial perturbations succeed in leading Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) to make wrong predictions, not only when attackers are aware of the architecture of DNNs, i.e., white-box setting, but also when they only have access to the input-output pairs of DNNs, i.e., black-box setting. This discovery exposes the potential danger in existing machine learning applications and encourages defenses against adversarial attacks. These defenses are divided into two families, namely reactive defenses and proactive defenses. Reactive defensesXu et al. (2017); Guo et al. (2017); Sun et al. (2019); Xie et al. (2017) aim to gain robustness by introducing an extra element to recognize or remove the adversarial context. Proactive defenses Goodfellow et al. (2014); Madry et al. (2017); Lyu et al. (2015); Chen et al. (2019) attempt to build networks inherently robust to adversarial attacks.
Transformations Xu et al. (2017); Guo et al. (2017), as a typical reactive approach, remove adversarial effects via applying simple filters. It is cheap but performs poorly against strong attacks, e.g., PGD Madry et al. (2017), C&W Carlini and Wagner (2017) and DeepFool Moosavi-Dezfooli et al. (2016). To augment the performance, randomness Raff et al. (2019); Prakash et al. (2018) and representation Moosavi-Dezfooli et al. (2018); Buckman et al. (2018); Liu et al. (2019) are introduced into transformation. Transformation gains robustness but loses accuracy, since the original images are altered when it discards adversarial context. The networks learn from original data and cannot recognize the distorted information.
Adversarial Training Goodfellow et al. (2014); Madry et al. (2017), as a proactive defense, augments the training process with adversarial images such that the network learns the relative knowledge. To produce adversarial images, adversarial training employees a special attack. Since different attacks have different preferences, the model is vulnerable to unseen attacks. The ensemble is a solution to amend this drawback. It consists of several sub-models which learn from similar but different training sets, for instance, applying Gaussian noise to inputs and bootstrap Strauss et al. (2017) to augment robustness. Incorporating randomness stabilizes the performance of ensemble models. Random Self-Ensemble (RSE) Liu et al. (2018) adds random noise layers to prevent strong gradient-based attacks.
Diversity is essential to ensembles. To increase the diversity of adversarial examples during the training, ensemble adversarial training Tramèr et al. (2017) adds adversarial examples transferred from other pre-trained models. Ensemble-of-specialists Abbasi and Gagné (2017) multiplies adversarial examples targeted over different incorrect labels. This defense is confirmed not robust enough He et al. (2017). Other than data augmentation, Adaptive Diversity Promoting (ADP) Pang et al. (2019) and Diversity Training Kariyappa and Qureshi (2019) design a regularizer to encourage diversity. However, these methods either fail in defending against strong attacks or are too expensive because it needs too many sub-models to achieve a decent diversity. So the question arises:
What is the advantageous diversity to improve the ensemble defenses against adversarial attacks?
This work investigates the answer to this question. Inspired by the transformation defenses, we train sub-models with different front filters, such as dimension reduction, color quantization, and frequency filter. The model trained on a particular front filter is sensitive to a specific type of distortion. These front filters distort adversarial contexts. At the same time, training with transformed data allows models to learn and maintain accuracy on them. We analyze the Pearson correlation coefficient among the models and the performance of the models and their ensemble. We infer that the sub-models with weakly correlated sensitivity constitute a more robust ensemble, and propose a simple and powerful defense framework for ensemble models based on the inference. Finally, the experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method improves the robust of the network against adversarial examples.
In this section, we first state some basic notions of DNNs and the definition of DNN robustness in a local region. Then we recall the norm-based robustness region, as well as the Lipschitz constant of DNNs. After that, we give a brief introduction to a few existing attacks used in our experiments.
2.1 Deep Neural Network and Local Robustness
Our work concentrates on the image classification task. A DNN, which can be characterized as a function
, usually gives prediction by maximizing the output vector, i.e.,, where represents an image. To optimize the network, we minimize the cost function , in which is the ground truth.
Intuitively, the local robustness of a DNN ensures the consistency of its behavior of a given input under certain perturbations, and a strict robustness condition ensures that there is no adversarial example around an input . Formally, the local robustness of a DNN can be defined as below.
Definition 1 (DNN robustness).
Given a DNN and an input region , we say that is (locally) robust in if for any , we have .
In a typical way, the region here is usually defined by the neighborhood of an input, where -norm balls are commonly used. As the case of the , the neighborhood of an input bounded by the -norm can be described as an ball: The (closed) ball with the center and the radius is defined as .
Lipschitz constant of DNNs
The Lipschitz constant of a function is a measure to indicates the maximum ratio between variations in the output space and variations in the input space. In Ruan et al. (2018), a DNN is proved to be Lipschitz continuous. Namely, there exists , s.t. for any ,
and here is called a Lipschitz constant of . Generally, DNNs with a smaller Lipschitz constant are likely to be more robust.
2.2 Adversarial Attacks
Adversarial attacking methods attempt to find an imperceptible perturbation leading to misclassification, also regarded as a testing method for network robustness. We present several fundamental untargeted attacks widely used in existing literature. Hereafter, we denote a potential adversarial example as , the adversarial perturbation as , and the gradient calculated from the cost function to input as .
Fast Gradient Sign Method (FGSM)
Fast Gradient Sign Method (FGSM) by Goodfellow and his colleagues in 2014 (Goodfellow et al., 2014) simply uses the one-step gradient to generate the perturbation:
It is the perturbation that minimizes the first-order objective function for the constraint .
Projected Gradient Descent (PGD)
PGD initializes and then iterates by progressing in the opposite direction of the gradient with stepsize . The accumulated distortion are projected onto an -norm ball (Madry et al., 2017):
where , and
The -norm ball used for projection is , centered in with radius . Again, the attack does not end when hits the boundary of the ball for the first time. It continues and seeks to minimize the objective function while remaining on the sphere.
Basic Iterative Method (BIM)
BIM (Kurakin et al., 2016), as an iterative version of FGSM, it employees the sign of gradients of network iteratively with stepsize to update adversarial perturbations. The principle of BIM is similar to a -norm version of PGD. All the pixels in the adversarial example are clipped into range , i.e., adversarial perturbations are resized within the surface of an -norm ball with radius . The main difference is that PGD utilizes a random initialization and uses the gradients directly.
Backward Pass Differentiable Approximation (BPDA)
BPDA (Athalye et al., 2018) allows attackers to generate adversarial perturbations targeted at the network with defenses as a whole. BPDA approximates derivatives by computing the forward pass normally and computing the backward pass using a differentiable approximation of the defense function. For instance, if it is impossible to calculate gradients through the transformation, BPDA generates adversarial examples by including the transformation during the forward pass and replaces the transformation with an identity function during the backward pass under the assumption that the transformation output is close to the original input.
In this section, we state the structure of our ensemble framework. A filter is an image transformation that extracts some important features of the original image. We embed a filter in each sub-model as the core component, which provides the diversity of sub-models. Then we analyze the relationship between the correlations of the filters and the local robustness, which induces a principle of choosing the optimal filter combination. This improves the ensemble defense against adversarial attacks.
3.1 Filter-based Ensemble
, an input image is pre-processed by three different filters, and the obtained results are then respectively fed into three DNNs, which classify them and output the classification label individually. In the end, the results of each sub-models are combined by a voting mechanism. Formally, a certain sub-model applies a front filter, denoted by, on the original inputs, and the DNN model follows the filter by . Then an ensemble model with sub-models can be expressed as
where the function outputs the mode of the results of the sub-models, i.e., the classification label which appears the most times.
We call a input stable for an ensemble model if the output labels of all the sub-models in are consistent. It is easy to obtain the following proposition.
The ensemble model cannot be attacked at a stable input by the perturbation if any two sub-models are not attacked simultaneously at their respective inputs by the perturbations .
To defend against an adversarial attack, we propose to build a more robust ensemble model. Unlike network-based defenses like adversarial training, we do not focus on training skills for the sub-models to improve robustness. On the contrary, our principle is to enhance the diversity of sub-models by extracting partial features of inputs using differentiated front filters. Since it is hard for an adversarial attack to effectively affect all sub-models at the same time, the ensemble model achieves better robustness from the diversity of front filters.
So, the key to establish this ensemble model is how to choose a proper filter combination that provide both accuracy and robustness. In the following, we explain how we gain a more robust ensemble model through the relation among the filters.
3.2 Low Correlation Implies Strong Robustness
In this subsection, we give a theoretical description on the intuition that a low correlation of the sensitivity of two filters implies a more robust ensemble model under the assumption that the filters are of high quality, and this will guide us to choose the optimal filter combination from the candidates.
For an input and a perturbation , we define a function as
to measure the sensitivity of a filter , i.e., the -norm of the perturbation affecting the input of the DNN in the sub-model. Considering
as a random variable, we invoke thePearson correlation coefficient to evaluate the correlation of the sensitivity of two filters, which is expressed as
We assume that the filters in the ensemble model are of high quality, which means that the interpretation of the difference of two images by each filter sincerely reflects their semantics difference in statistics, i.e., the random variables and are identically distributed. Under this assumption, the equation (5) indicates that is monotonically increasing w.r.t. .
For a certain DNN and an input classified into label , we define the score difference by . Then the robust radius at an input
can be estimated according to the following lemma.
Lemma 1 (Yang et al. (2021)).
Consider a DNN defined by , whose Lipschitz constant is . Then for an input , the DNN is robust in with .
Then, we can infer that two DNNs and cannot be attacked simultaneously at and by the perturbations and respectively, if
In our framework, and are the input processed by two filters, and and are the sensitivity calculated by (4). It is clear that the right part in the inequality (6) is determined by the structure and parameters of the DNNs, while the left part is determined by the front filters.
The expectation is a statistical description of the item in (6): A small expectation imples that the value of tends to be small statistically. Consequently, by combining (5), (6) and Proposition 1, we infer that low correlation of the sensitivity among filters implies strong robustness of ensemble models. This leads to our principle as ‘minimum correlation coefficients’ for choosing filter combinations, i.e., to optimize the robustness of our ensemble model, we choose the filters among which the correlation is the weakest.
Note that the cosine similarity of
Note that the cosine similarity ofbetween two filters is also a measure of their correlation. However, we only consider the sensitivity from the perspective of magnitudes of perturbation vectors generated by filters, because the gradient of the entire sub-model depends on both the filter and the DNN, so we do not choose to analyze their directions without considering the following DNNs.
3.3 Filter Candidates
The original image is prop-processed by a filter before it is sent to the network. Therefore, some information is discarded and thus the overall entropy of the image is reduced. It is also regarded as a manual feature extraction procedure that extracts the most important features that benefit the task. It is generally harder to attack the filtered image because there is less information that the attacking methods can utilize. The filters we use are categorized into the following four classes.
The easiest way to reduce the entropy of an image is to reduce its dimensionality. Color pictures have three dimensions, i.e., length, width, and color channels. It is simple to reduce the first two dimensions by downsizing an image. Grayscale transformation can compress the color channels into one grayscale channel. Generally, downsizing and grayscale transformation preserve the overview of the original image with certain loss of details. Bilinear interpolation is used in downsizing filters. We use the ITU-R BT.601111BT.601 : Studio encoding parameters of digital television for standard 4:3 and wide screen 16:9 aspect ratios: https://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-BT.601-7-201103-I/en luma transformation for the grayscale filter.
Another way to reduce the complexity of an image is to reduce its number of colors. The size of a CIFAR-10 image is. It may have colors at most. But it can still be recognizable using much fewer colors. The fast octree algorithm Gervautz and Purgathofer (1988) is adopted to reduce the colors of the image. A full-size octree with a depth of seven can be used to partition the RGB color space. The octree subdivides the colorspace into eight octants recursively. Each leaf node of the octree represents an individual color. The fast octree algorithm builds the tree according to the color of a given image and merges the leaf nodes when the number of colors overflows.
In digital image processing, frequency filters are commonly applied to extract useful features from pictures. The high-frequency features are usually the noise and the details of the original image, and the low-frequency features are often its overview. The high-pass filters suppress the low-frequency features, and the low-pass filters do the opposite. Our low-pass and high-pass filters are based on the discrete Fourier Transform. Via shifting the low-frequency part to the center of the spectrum and multiplying it by a Gaussian mask (high-pass mask) element-wise, we obtain the low-pass (high-pass) filtered image.
Inputs for a DNN can be any real value, while the 8-bit RGB color model takes integer values in the range of . To keep the practical meaning of an input, real numbers are approximated by its closest integer. This is essential since the DNN for image classification should have actual image data instead of arbitrary inputs. When we use iterative methods to attack the DNN, discretization can help generate practical adversarial examples. In our ensemble model, every sub-model trained with the original data is equipped with a discretization filter.
4 Experimental Evaluation
In this section, we demonstrate the experimental results to support our inference and our method. We first give a brief introduction of the experimental settings, and then show our study of the correlation between filters in Section 3.2. We measure the robustness of our models with respect to transferability, via calculating the accuracy of our models on adversarial examples produced by attacking the original network. In the end, two front filters are chosen by ‘minimum correlation coefficients’ to constitute the ensemble defense. We compare its robustness with adversarial training. We generate adversarial examples under various attacks implemented in FoolBox Rauber et al. (2017, 2020). The FoolBox version is 3.31, and the license is MIT license. All experiments are conducted on a Windows 10 laptop with Intel i7-9750H, GTX 2060, and 16G RAM.
Dataset and Network
We train our models on the CIFAR-10 Krizhevsky et al. (2009) dataset under the MIT license. The CIFAR-10 dataset contains RGB images in total with ten exclusive classes. We train our ResNet18 He et al. (2016) models on the training images and test them on the
testing images. We use the stochastic gradient descent optimizer for training with, , and as the learning rate successively.
4.1 The Optimal Filter Combination for Ensemble
We analyze the Pearson correlation coefficients for each pair of the candidate filters and pick the least correlated filters for the ensemble with the minimum correlation coefficients. We also evaluate the robustness of sub-models on adversarial examples produced on the original network.
Statistical Correlation Analysis for Filters
We apply noise of size to images randomly picked from the test set and evaluate Pearson correlation coefficient according to (5). As reported by Figure 2, the correlation coefficient between the high-pass filtered data and the original inputs is the largest, i.e., . The grayscale filtered data gets
, the second to the original inputs. It indicates that adversarial examples produced on the original network easily transfer to the sub-models with these filters. The downsizing filter strongly correlates With the low-pass filter, implying that they are probably deceived by the same adversarial examples. Thecolor reduction filter shows little correlation, i.e., , to the low-pass filter, and they both have a relatively low correlation to the original data, i.e., and . According to minimum correlation coefficients, the robust ensemble model includes the original network and the two sub-models trained with the low-pass filter and the color reduction filter.
Transfer-based Attack Analysis
We generate adversarial examples against the original network by FGSM and PGD attacks with different values of attacking radius and test them on the sub-models trained with filtered data. In Figure 3, the sub-models with the low-pass, color quantization, and downsizing filters perform better than the original network against both FGSM and PGD attacks. The accuracy of these sub-models remains above when the attacking radius is under the FGSM attack. The PGD attack is more powerful against the original network and drops its accuracy to nearly . The sub-model with a downsizing filter has the lowest accuracy among the three sub-models, which is under the PGD attack. However, the sub-models with the grayscale and the high-pass filters are vulnerable to the transfer-based attack. These sub-models have lower accuracy than the original network under the FGSM attack with . It is consistent with our analysis in Section 3.2, which suggests that these two filters should not be part of the ensemble.
|(a) FGSM||(b) PGD|
4.2 Comparison with Different Ensemble Methods
In this section, we compare the adversarial accuracy of our ensemble model with different ensemble models. The details of each ensemble model are as follows:
Minimum correlated Ensemble According to statistical correlation analysis for filters, we choose the color reduction filter and the low-pass filter for the ensemble, which have the lowest correlation. The ensemble includes the original network to maintain state-of-the-art accuracy on clean data.
Maximum correlated Ensemble The worst-case situation suggested by statistical correlation analysis is to constitute the ensemble with the original network and the two sub-models with the high-pass and grayscale filters, whose correlation is the highest as shown in Figure 2.
We compare the minimum correlated model to the Gaussian noise ensemble model and the maximum correlated ensemble model. We choose the BPDA attack based on the BIM to attack ensemble models. We use the sum of the gradient of sub-models to attack the ensemble model as a whole. The number of iterations is , and the step size is . Hereafter, the vote-based ensemble follows the voting mechanism described in Section 3, and the score-based ensemble outputs the class with the maximum average score.
According to Figure 4(a), when the disturbance is , , , and , the score-based accuracy of the minimum correlated ensemble model is , , , and higher than the Gaussian noise model, and is , , , and higher than the maximum correlated model, respectively. The minimum correlated ensemble model also has higher vote-based adversarial accuracy than the Gaussian ensemble model and the maximum correlated ensemble model. It agrees with the previous analysis that the ensemble model with less correlated sub-models obtains better adversarial robustness.
Figure 4(b) demonstrates the accuracy of sub-models when the ensemble model is attacked as a whole. When we attack the Gaussian noise ensemble model, the accuracy differences among its sub-models are close, which is at most. Also, the accuracy of its three sub-models decreases in a similar pattern. However, the sub-models of the minimum correlated ensemble model perform differently. The accuracy of the sub-model with the low-pass filter stabilizes when the radius is larger than . The accuracy of the sub-model with the 16 color filter and the original network decreases with a relatively larger accuracy difference of at least. It justifies that our minimum correlated ensemble model improves robustness against adversarial attacks by introducing advantageous diversity.
4.3 Comparison with Adversarial Training
Adversarial training is one of the most effective methods to improve the robustness of a DNN. We use the method proposed in Shafahi et al. (2019) and compare the robustness of our minimum correlated ensemble model with the adversarial training. The adversarial training procedure takes iterations with the maximal perturbation size .
Comparison with a single Adversarial Training Model
We first compare our ensemble model with one single adversarial training model. The grey line in Figure 5(a) shows the adversarial robustness of a single adversarially trained model. Our ensemble model has better adversarial accuracy under all perturbations. The score-based accuracy of our method is higher than the single adversarial trained model at . It is worth highlighting that every sub-model in our ensemble model has no defense mechanisms acting on the network. In other words, our ensemble-based defense can build robust models competing with adversarial training without manipulating the network.
Comparison with Adversarial Training Ensembles
We compare our method with the ensemble of three independent adversarially trained models. The orange lines in Figure 5(a) show the performance of the ensemble model using adversarial training. Remarkably, our score-based ensemble model has better accuracy than its counterpart with adversarial training when the perturbation size is large, i.e., . Meanwhile, our vote-based ensemble is very close to the one with adversarial training. Our ensemble model has a comparable defense to the ensemble of adversarially trained sub-models.
The orange lines in the right part of Figure 5(b) depict the accuracy of adversarially trained sub-models when the ensemble model is attacked as a whole. Comparing with the sub-models trained with Gaussian noise in Figure 4, adversarial training does not significantly improve the diversity between sub-models. The accuracy difference between sub-models is still relatively small, and that means the attacking methods can affect different sub-models simultaneously.
Since the adversarial training works on the network level and our method works on the data level, it is natural to combine these two methods. We demonstrate our ensemble model with adversarial training in Figure 5(a) using the cyan lines. Our ensemble model with adversarial training reaches a better robustness performance in both score-based and vote-based settings. The vote-based ensemble model achieves accuracy at . Conclusively, we build an ensemble model with high adversarial robustness using both our filter-based defense and adversarial training.
In this work, we investigate the advantageous diversity of the ensemble model against adversarial attacks. By studying the robustness of ensemble DNNs and the Pearson correlation coefficient among models trained with filters, we propose the "minimum correlation coefficients" principle for choosing filters, which is instrumental in building the ensemble defense.
Beyond existing ensemble defenses, we consider the diversity of ensemble models with a new perspective. We obtain the diversity from the filtered training data and confirm it experimentally. We observe that our ensemble model without adversarial information is more robust against adversarial attacks than adversarial training models.
Our discovery not only contributes to proposing a decent robust ensemble model but also supplies data diversity. As our future work, it is interesting to study further how much robustness we could gain from data diversity and model ensemble. We are also considering extending our framework to larger datasets like ImageNet and training our sub-models using different network structures.
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- Foolbox: a python toolbox to benchmark the robustness of machine learning models. In Proceedings of International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML), Reliable Machine Learning in the Wild Workshop, External Links: Cited by: §4.
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How the protection of Citadel got cracked. Recently on a forum someone requested cbcs.exe (Citadel Backconnect Server) If you want to read more about the Backconnect on Citadel, the link that g4m372 shared is cool:
Malware don't need Coffee: Inside Citadel 22.214.171.124 C&C & Builder - Botnet Control Panel. Win32/Gapz: steps of evolution. The Win32/Gapz malware family was mentioned publicly for the first time in the middle of November 2012, by the Russian antivirus company Doctor Web (Trojan.Gapz.1 infecting Windows in a new manner).
But I didn’t find the technical details about this threat in that report and so prepared a deeper analysis. Win32/Gapz uses many exploitation techniques for implementing local privilege escalation (LPE) and infecting the VBR (Volume Boot Record) and MBR (Master Boot Record) in the earliest samples seen. The first interesting finding is that the VBR infection method is really new and not something we’ve seen before in other bootkit families. And the second interesting characteristic is the method used for injecting the malicious payload into user-mode system processes.
The VBR infector changes only four bytes in bootstrap code in order to get control so as to deliver the malicious shellcode payload. What versions of MS Windows can be infected? • x64: Windows Vista SP2 and higher. Banking Trojan Targets South Korean Banks; Uses Pinterest as C&C Channel. We recently found a new banking Trojan which targeted several banks in South Korea.
This isn’t the first, though: in June last year, we saw that several online banking threats widened their range and targeted South Korean banks using various techniques. Throughout the course of monitoring similar threats, we noticed a new wave of banking Trojans targeting South Korean banks that show unusual behavior, including the use of Pinterest as their command and control (C&C) channel. Infection Via Malicious Iframe Injection This threat is currently affecting users in South Korea via compromised sites leading to exploit kits. Malware’s new target: your password manager’s password. Cyber criminals have started targeting the password managers that protect an individual's most sensitive credentials by using a keylogger to steal the master password in certain cases, according to research from data-protection company IBM Trusteer.
The research found that a configuration file, which attackers use to tailor the Citadel trojan for specific campaigns, had been modified to start up a keylogger when the user opened either Password Safe or KeePass, two open-source password managers. While malware has previously targeted the credentials stored in the password managers included in popular Web browsers, third-party password managers have typically not been targeted. While the current impact of the attack is low, the implications of the attacker’s focus is that password managers will soon come under more widespread assault, Dana Tamir, director of enterprise security for IBM Trusteer, told Ars Technica. Q1 2014: Mobile Banking Trojans Double, Surge in Bitcoin Wallet Attacks, and Cyber-Espionage Threats Back from the Dead. ABINGDON, England, April 24, 2014 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- ABINGDON, England, April 24, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- In December, Kaspersky Lab published its threat forecast for 2014.
Three months later, the experts found that all three of their 'end user forecasts' had already been confirmed. Facebook Webinject Leads to iBanking Mobile Bot. iBanking is a malicious Android application that when installed on a mobile phone is able to spy on its user’s communications.
This bot has many interesting phone-specific capabilities, including capturing incoming and outgoing SMS messages, redirecting incoming voice calls, and even capturing audio using the device’s microphone. As reported by independent researcher Kafeine, this mobile application was for sale in underground forums and was used by several banking Trojans in an attempt to bypass a mobile two-factor authentication method put forth by some financial institutions.
This method, usually called “mobile transaction authorization number” (mTAN) or mToken in the financial realm, is used by several banks throughout the world to authorize banking operations, but is now also increasingly used by popular internet services such as Gmail, Facebook and Twitter. Recently, it was revealed by RSA that iBanking’s source code was leaked on underground forums. AV Labs Identifies Dangerous Zeus Banking Trojan Variant. April 3, 2014 | By Comodo AV Labs Comodo Antivirus Labs has identified a new and extremely dangerous variant of the Zeus banking Trojan.
Hackers use Zeus to launch attacks that obtain the login credentials of visitors to online banking sites and commit financial fraud. A Closer Look: Perkele Android Malware Kit. In March 2013 I wrote about Perkele , a crimeware kit designed to create malware for Android phones that can help defeat multi-factor authentication used by many banks. In this post, we’ll take a closer look at this threat, examining the malware as it is presented to the would-be victim as well as several back-end networks set up by cybercrooks who have been using mobile bots to fleece banks and their customers.
Perkele disguises itself as various Android security applications and certificates. Perkele is sold for $1,000 , and it’s made to interact with a wide variety of malware already resident on a victim’s PC. When a victim visits his bank’s Web site, the Trojan (be it Zeus or Citadel or whatever) injects malicious code into the victim’s browser, prompting the user to enter his mobile information, including phone number and OS type.
The Wild Wild Web: YouTube ads serving malware. There’s never a dull moment in the security industry, just as we heard about the latest IE 0day; one of our field security engineers in the Americas stumbled upon a YouTube link that was hosting malware.
The vulnerability is not in YouTube as such, but the ad-network seems to be the culprit in this case. We’re working with Google security team to get to the bottom of this, in the meantime some quick details about the infection below. Summary - Classic drive-by download attack, infects the user by exploiting client software vulnerabilities. Malware Research Resources. Pages Sunday, February 16, 2014 Malware Research Resources Below you will find some of my favorite malware research resources.Books:
Analyzing Environment-Aware Malware. A look at Zeus Trojan variant called Citadel evading traditional sandboxes Fighting traditional sandboxes (or dynamic analysis systems in general) typically comes in the form of detecting the analysis environment or evading analysis through means of behavior triggers as mentioned in a previous blog post: Using High-Resolution Dynamic Analysis for BHO Trigger Detection.
Some variants of the notorious Zeus trojan family use a different approach to hinder analysis: Host fingerprinting. Zeus Encryption Keys. Community Momentum is Rising! The amount of research pouring out of the Volatility community recently has been very exciting. Zeus Encryption Keys. YARA - The pattern matching swiss knife for malware researchers. YARA in a nutshell YARA is a tool aimed at (but not limited to) helping malware researchers to identify and classify malware samples.
Security Conference Ranking and Statistic. Computer Security Conference Ranking and Statistic. The State of Financial Trojans in 2013. Cuckoo Sandbox on Hardware: Preparing the hardware node for cloning. 64-Bit Zeus Banking Trojan Communicates Over Tor Network. Online banking faces a new threat. On July 18, 2013, the following post was published on a closed cybercriminal forum: The author of this post was offering a malicious program that could be used to attack “about 100 banks” by seeding add-on code onto bank websites viewed with Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox, with VNC connections, and other ways to attack “any bank in any country.”
Kaspersky Lab immediately began to dig deeper, and discovered that the program the malicious users were offering was Trojan-Banker.Win32/64.Neverquest. |
In Summary, in this course YOU Will LEARN THE FOLLOWING:
– How to prepare the penetration testing lab.
– How to get comfortable with Kali Linux by getting the important required commands.
– How to use Linux commands & how to interact with the command terminal.
– How to change your system MAC address (Spoof) to stay anonymous.
– How to attack any close wireless network and get all details about it (including target network MAC address, SSID, Encryption Type, …etc).
– How to get the MAC addresses for all clients connected to the target network without even knowing the password of the target router.
– How to Perform (word list) Attacks to get passwords.
– How to perform fake-authentication attack to target router without even knowing the password of the target network.
– How to perform De-Authentication attacks without even knowing the password of the target network.
– How to perform ARP attack without even knowing the password of the target network.
– How to hack wireless networks to step by step.
– How to get Wi-Fi passwords for WEP , WPA and WPA2.
– How to Sniff Data from the network you hacked.
– How to perform ARP spoofing attack to be the man in the middle MITM to intercept user names and passwords.
– How to know who is connected to the network you hacked.
– How to scan network for more details about connected devices.
– How to intercept network traffic.
– How to use many tools, tricks and techniques to hack networks.
-How to generate your own viruses.
– How to hide your virus in any other file extension (jpg, pdf, docx, xlsx..)
– How to gain access to remote computers.
– How to hack Mic, Camera, and Keyboard keys (Key Logger)..
– Many other cool stuff about network hacking.
– How to keep yourself protected from the above mentioned attacks.
*** You will get 3.5 hours of hacking and hacking techniques ***
*** You will start from 0 to reach a good level of understanding and practical use of Linux and hacking tools ***
- This course is created for educational purposes only, all the attacks are launched in my own lab or against systems that I have permission to test.
- This course is totally a product of Mohammad Hamza Sheikh and no other organization is associated with it or a certification exam. Although, you will receive a Course Completion Certification from Udemy, apart from that NO OTHER ORGANIZATION IS INVOLVED. |
- A port scanning utility to check the services, ports, software version & finger print of OS etc.
- Always update the nmap to the latest version.
Check the current version of nmap
#rpm -qa |grep nmap
Now upgrade to the latest version by downloading the package
# wget http://nmap.org/dist/nmap-5.00-1.i386.rpm
# rpm -Uvh nmap-5.00-1.i386.rpm
Usage of nmap:
Running the nmap as root uses the SYN based scan(Half opened connection) which is less tracable
(SYN Stealth scan)
nmap (TCP SYN) -> Target (ACK) -> nmap declines ACK
Running nmap as non-privileged user opens a standard TCP connections (3 way handshake)
nmap (TCP SYN) -> Target (ACK) -> nmap (SYN|ACK)
#nmap -v localhost
Shows the ports opened in localhost, scan runns in (-v) verbose mode.
Nmap to store output to a certain file
We can store the output into varios formats. below option stores as a normal file
# nmap -v oN nmap.scan.localhost.file localhost||remotehost
# vi || cat || less || more nmap.scan.localhost.file
This can be kept for the later reference.
Nmap to scan the UDP Listners
By default NMAP scanns the TCP ports and enabling the -sU option will endup with UDP scan
# nmap -v -sU localhost||remotehost
Nmap to scan a perticular port
# nmap -v -p 631 localhost||remotehost
Nmap to give the Os finger print of remote system
# nmap -v -O localhost||remotehost
This will give the output about the remote host OS details.
NMAP scanning is done to tune the server for higher security by closing the unnecessary ports. Read http://www.insecure.org to explore more in NMAP. Keep in mind this might be the same tool that the hackers use to scan our network to check the services running so that they can use its vulnerability to break through.
NESSUS & Port scanner are the tools that can check the vulnerability in system.
Download the tool from http://www.nessus.org and exicute the nessus installer as root.
- gtk-2.0 (XWindows develop tools)
# run the installation script to install the nessus.
It will ask for certain criterias to finish the installation including Activation code.
Post installation procedure
After completion of the Nessus installation, as per the instruction from the script have to finish the following process
Create the SSL certificate for Nessus to communicate with nessus server and client as mentioned in the installation script.
# /use/the/path/provided in installation output
Add a nessusd user according to the output of installion
Start Nessus daemon
Nessus starts as deamon and listen on port 1241
# lsof [email protected]:1241
This will show the service binded to the port
Start Nessus client and start the scanning..
Now configure the preferences in the GUI interface including the nessus server, port, username plugins that can be enabled etc..
Accept the certificate, enable the plugins for platforms, credentials of remote system in which the nessus should start scan, connection options etc.
To start the scan go to Target and start the scan . After the successfull scan it will show the result of vulnerability scan. This will tell that which services are less secured and what mesures should be taken to secure the services.
Eg:- SSH is supporting older version of the SSH protocols and need to configure the sshd service to use the protocol2 only. SSH protocol-1 uses ssh_host_key. but ssh protocol-ver2 uses ssh_host_rsa||dsa_keys
Nessus is a powerfull tool that help us to configure our servers more securly by pointing the vulnerability in the packages and configurations of various services. |
|reply to justin |
Re: Blackice "Witty" Worm: source port 4000 UDP
said by justin:Same idea, I would speculate, with malware that acts in an overt way versus malware that acts more covertly.
But then, in the real world, a virus that kills the host is not a winning strategy. This is one that kills shortly after and hopefully after infecting a few more, like Ebola. Spectacular but short lived.
Exploit-based malware that scans like mad (high packet rates and broad IP address space "coverage") draws more attention to multiple aspects of the scanning (not just the ports, but also things like the "exploit"). And it will likely provoke a higher/escalated response to address the scanning -- usually involving an escalation of traffic filtering and patching. (Blaster being an example, I believe.) E-mail based malware is a more complicated situation, I believe (more factors).
In this case, I don't think the author of this thing cares as much about the level of response -- other than striking at a time which allows for a perhaps two-day headstart -- since the "average" response time is still so long that a good portion of the infected systems will have crashed before someone gets to them.
Feedback? e-mail: [email protected] |
The RIG Exploit Kit has been causing trouble again, this time delivering a backdoor trojan called Grobios, which takes great pains to avoid detection and evade virtual and sandbox environments.
In a May 14 blog post, researchers from FireEye report that the trojan dates back to at least Mar 10, at which time victims were being directed to the RIG landing page after visiting the domain latorre[.]com[.]au. The domain had been compromised with an injected malicious iframe capable of loading a malvertisement domain that in turns leads to RIG.
Researchers and blog post co-authors Irshad Muhammad, Shahzad Ahmed, Hassan Faizan, Zain Gardezi, report that the developers clearly tried to impede any attempts to dissect the malware, as it was well-protected with multiple anti-debugging and anti-analysis and anti-VM techniques.
However, this much is clear: "The main purpose of Grobios malware is to help attacker establish a strong foothold in the system by employing various kind of evasions and anti-VM techniques, said Ali Islam, director of FireEye Labs, in an email interview with SC Media. "Once a strong foothold is established, attacker can drop [the] payload of his/her choice, which can be anything from [an] infostealer to ransomware."
In an effort to evade static detection, the studied Grobios sample was packed with the Windows executables compression tool PECompact. "The unpacked sample has no function entries in the import table," the blog post states. "It uses API hashing to obfuscate the names of API functions it calls and parses the PE header of the DLL files to match the name of a function to its hash. The malware also uses stack strings."
Before connecting to its two command-and-control servers (which are hardcoded and obfuscated into the malware), Grobios also performs a series of checks to detect numerous VM and analysis environments, including Xen, QEMU, VMware, Virtualbox and Hyper-V. For instance, it searches for analysis tools on the system; checks for certain telltale keywords in the username and registry keys; and looks for hashes of blacklisted process names, driver names, sandbox product IDs and DLL module names.
For persistence, the trojan drops multiple copies of itself into various folders and subfolders, disguising itself as legitimate installed software and using the Windows Encrypted File System to protect at least one of these copies.
"The malware changes the file Created, Modified, and Accessed times of all of its dropped copies to the Last Modified time of ntdll.dll," the blog post continues, adding that Grobios can also bypass the "File Downloaded from the Internet" warning by removing the :Zone.Identifier flag using the DeleteFile API. |
Source: gualtiero boffi – shutterstock
- Customers affiliated to Microsoft’s Azure computer network misconfigured some nodes and allowed hackers to use them to mine Monero (XMR).
- Attacks affected 10 nodes of the Kubeflow learning machine that is part of the Azure network.
In a June 10 report, Microsoft revealed details about the discovery of a vulnerability that was exploited by attackers in its Azure computer network. The report was published by Yossi Weizman, a security research software engineer for the Azure Security Center (ASC). The vulnerability allowed attackers to use the Azure network, through the nodes of a learning machine called Kubeflow to mine Monero (XMR).
Kubeflow is a learning machine toolkit for the Kubernetes platform. Microsoft claims that Kubeflow has gained popularity and because of its computational power, it has become a target for cyber attacks:
Kubeflow has grown and become a popular framework for running machine learning tasks in Kubernetes. Nodes that are used for ML tasks are often relatively powerful, and in some cases include GPUs. This fact makes Kubernetes clusters that are used for ML tasks a perfect target for crypto mining campaigns, which was the aim of this attack.
Misconfigured nodes allowed hacker to mine Monero (XMR)
The Azure Security Center was able to determine that the access vector of the attack was the Kubeflow framework. The ASC discovered a suspicious image in a data repository within clusters of the learning machine. This image was running the XMRIG miner, as seen below.
According to ASC, the framework of the Kubeflow learning machine is made up of several services including: framework for training models, Katib and Jupyter servers, among others. Users of the virtual machine access these services through an internal dashboard from the Kubeflow node. The configuration of the dashboard can be changed for the user’s convenience, as was the case with this attack according to the Azure Security Center. However, this configuration allowed the nodes to be exposed to the internet and left them susceptible to attacks:
Users should use port-forward to access the dashboard (which tunnels the traffic via the Kubernetes API server). (…) without this action, accessing to the dashboard requires tunneling through the Kubernetes API server and isn’t direct. By exposing the Service to the Internet, users can access to the dashboard directly. However, this operation enables insecure access to the Kubeflow dashboard, which allows anyone to perform operations in Kubeflow, including deploying new containers in the cluster.
This way attackers can access Kubeflow’s dashboard and can deploy a malicious backdoor container. Using this method, attackers can upload a malicious image like the one shown above to the Jupyter notebook server to mine Monero. The Azure Security Center made a number of recommendations to prevent these attacks and invited its users to review the security aspects when using Kubeflow.
As reported by CNF, Monero is one of the preferred cryptocurrencies for these attacks. Due to its characteristics the identity of the attackers is protected. In May, a series of reports from recognized scientific institutions, such as the National Supercomputing Service of the United Kingdom, revealed that attackers used the computer power of their supercomputers to mine Monero. Among the countries affected were the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland and Spain.
Last updated on |
Trendmicro discovered a new backdoor which they have attributed to the advanced persistent threat actor known as Earth Kitsune, which they have covered before. Since 2019, Earth Kitsune has been distributing variants of self-developed backdoors to targets, primarily individuals who are interested in North Korea. In many of the cases, they have investigated in the past, the threat actor used watering hole tactics by compromising websites related to North Korea and injecting browser exploits into them. In the latest activity they analyze here, Earth Kitsune used a similar tactic but instead of using browser exploits, employed social engineering instead.
MALWARE FAMILIES: Kitsune, WhiskerSpy
ATT&CK IDS: T1055 - Process Injection, T1189 - Drive-by Compromise, T1176 - Browser Extensions, T1106 - Native API, T1059 - Command and Scripting Interpreter, T1566 - Phishing |
Discover Hacks/Cracks News
PyTorch Suffers Supply Chain Attack via Dependency Confusion
Users who deployed the nightly builds of PyTorch between Christmas and New Year's Eve likely received a rogue package as part of the installation that siphoned off sensitive data from their systems. The incident was the result of an attack called dependency confusion that continues to impact package managers and development environments if hardening steps are not taken.
"If you installed PyTorch nightly on Linux via pip between December 25, 2022, and December 30, 2022, please uninstall it and torchtriton immediately, and use the latest nightly binaries (newer than December 30, 2022)," the PyTorch maintainers said in a security advisory.
PyTorch is a framework for developing machine learning applications in the fields of computer vision and natural language processing that is a continuation of the older and no longer maintained Torch library. PyTorch was originally developed by Meta AI, the artificial intelligence laboratory of Meta, Inc., but is now an open-source project maintained by the PyTorch Foundation under the Linux Foundation's umbrella. |
This coded boot virus is named by a string contained in its body. Text in the string contains a grammatically incorrect English piece of text:
This virus is from Mexico, I have 15 years old.
When a computer attempts to boot from an infected diskette the virus attacks the hard disc MBR, occupies the interrupt INT 13h and tries to infect the boot sector of any diskette in the drive that is not write protected. It checks the system date and on April 7 it overwrites the disk by a Spanish text string.
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Updated apache and httpd packages which fix a number of security issues are now available for Red Hat Linux 6.2, 7, 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, and 8.0.
The Apache HTTP Web Server is a secure, efficient, and extensible web server that provides HTTP services. Buffer overflows in the ApacheBench support program (ab.c) in Apache versions prior to 1.3.27, and Apache versions 2.x prior to 2.0.43, allow a malicious Web server to cause a denial of service (DoS) and possibly execute arbitrary code via a long response. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project has assigned the name CAN-2002-0843 to this issue. Two cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities are present in the error pages for the default "404 Not Found" error and for the error response when a plain HTTP request is received on an SSL port. Both of these issues are only exploitable if the "UseCanonicalName" setting has been changed to "Off", and wildcard DNS is in use. These issues could allow remote attackers to execute scripts as other webpage visitors, for instance, to steal cookies. These issues affect versions of Apache 1.3 before 1.3.26, versions of Apache 2.0 before 2.0.43, and versions of mod_ssl before 2.8.12. (CAN-2002-0840, CAN-2002-1157) The shared memory scoreboard in the HTTP daemon for Apache 1.3, prior to version 1.3.27, allows a user running as the "apache" UID to send a SIGUSR1 signal to any process as root, resulting in a denial of service (process kill) or other such behavior that would not normally be allowed. (CAN-2002-0839). Note that this issue does not affect Red Hat Linux 8.0. All users of the Apache HTTP Web Server are advised to upgrade to the applicable errata packages. For Red Hat Linux 6.2, 7, 7.1, 7.2, and 7.3, these packages include Apache version 1.3.27 which is not vulnerable to these issues. For Red Hat Linux 8.0, the fixes have been back-ported and applied to Apache version 2.0.40. Note that the instructions in the "Solution" section of this errata contain additional steps required to complete the upgrade process. |
Ping Identity Directory Server versions 188.8.131.52 and 184.108.40.206 have been released. These are security updates, and customers running 7.x versions are strongly encouraged to upgrade.
The most important update included in these releases is a fix for a critical security issue introduced in the 220.127.116.11 version that could cause certain passwords to be recorded in the clear on the server filesystem. There are two instances in which this could have occurred:
- When creating an encrypted backup of the alarms, alerts, configuration, encryption settings, schema, tasks, or trust store backends, the backup descriptor was supposed to include the identifier of the encryption settings definition that was used to protect the contents of the backup. Instead of this identifier, the server would incorrectly include the password that backed that encryption settings definition. This issue did not affect backups of local DB backends (like userRoot), the LDAP-accessible changelog, or the replication database.
The server maintains a tool invocation log (logs/tools/tool-invocation.log), which keeps track of certain commands that are run on the system, especially those that may be used to alter the server configuration or data. Among other things, this tool includes the name of the tool and the arguments used to run it. Sensitive arguments, like those used to provide passwords, should automatically be redacted. However, if the tool is run with an argument that provides the path to a file containing a password, a bug could have caused the tool invocation log to record the contents of the first line of that file (which usually contains the password itself) rather than the path to that file. The following command-line tools were affected by this issue:
Other tools were not affected by this second issue. Also note that this issue only involved passwords provided in files that were directly referenced as arguments on the command line. Passwords that were provided directly on the command line, and passwords that were automatically included because of their presence in a tools.properties file, were properly redacted. Because of the nature of this issue, regular user passwords are not likely to have been exposed, but the passwords of administrators that may have run commands on the server system could have been recorded.
In both issues above, the passwords were written to a file on the server filesystem with permissions that made them only accessible to the account used to run the server. Other accounts on the system should not have been able to read the contents of those files. Nevertheless, if you believe that any passwords may have been compromised, we recommend taking the following steps to mitigate the risk:
- Update the server to a version that includes the fix for this issue. If you’re running version a 7.2 version, then you should upgrade to the 18.104.22.168 release. If you’re running a 7.0 version, then you should upgrade to either version 22.214.171.124 or version 126.96.36.199.
- If you believe that any user passwords may have been exposed in the logs/tools/tool-invocation.log file, then change the passwords for those users and sanitize or delete that log file.
- If you believe that an encryption settings definition password may have been exposed in a backup descriptor, then create a new encryption settings definition, set it as the preferred definition for all subsequent encryption operations, export your data to LDIF, and re-import the data so that it is re-encrypted with the new definition. Create new backups, and destroy old backups with the compromised password.
In addition to fixing the bugs that led to the potential exposure of these passwords, we have added additional automated tests to help ensure that other problems like this do not occur in the future.
Other Changes Included in the 188.8.131.52 Release
The following additional fixes have been included in the 184.108.40.206 release:
- Updated the behavior that the server exhibits if an attribute type is removed from the schema while that attribute type is still referenced by one or more server backends. In earlier releases, the server could fail to open a backend that referenced an attribute type that is no longer defined in the schema. The server will now permit the backend to be opened, but will generate an alert about any missing attribute type definitions on startup, and will also generate an alert on any access to an entry that contains a reference to a missing attribute type. The server will also attempt to prevent the removal of an attribute type that is still referenced by any of the backends.
- Fixed an issue in which the stop-server.bat batch file may not function properly on Windows systems with a locale that uses a character other than a period as a decimal separator.
- Fixed an issue in which the periodic stats logger output could have been difficult to parse on systems with a locale that uses a character other than the period as a decimal separator.
- Fixed an issue that prevented creating a constructed virtual attribute for an attribute that was marked SINGLE-VALUE in the server schema.
- Fixed an issue in which backups of the server’s encryption settings database could have been (automatically or explicitly) encrypted with a key from the encryption settings database.
Other Changes Included in the 220.127.116.11 Release
The following additional fixes have been included in the 18.104.22.168 release:
- Added debug logging for DNS lookups that take longer than a configured length of time (10 seconds by default). A new “DNS Resolution” monitor entry is available to provide information about DNS lookups performed by the server.
- Fixed an issue in which SCIM searches could have an incorrect startIndex value if the scim-resources.xml file was configured with multiple base DNs.
- Fixed an issue that could cause an error while performing an encrypted LDIF export of a directory with a very large number of non-leaf entries. In such cases, the LDIF export will be split into multiple files, but the attempt to merge those files at the end of processing would fail. This error would not result in any data loss or exposure, and the exported data could still be imported by either providing all of the files to the import-ldif utility with separate –ldifFile arguments or by manually merging the files. |
1. Boot your system with a backtrack 5 live dvd ora pendrive.
2. Goto Backtrack > Exploitation Tools > Wireless Exploitation Tools > WLAN Exploitation > fern-wifi-cracker
3. This is will open a fern wifi cracker window. Now the First step is to select the interface. Here in my case i have selected wlan0 interface .
4. To scan for Access Point click on the 2nd button ( wifi icon ).
Once you get the Access Point ,various AP’s of WEP and WPA are detected.
Fern wifi cracking
Now I am going to crack the WEP Encryption .
In my case , i have selected one Access Point and click on the Attack button.
Access Points fern wifi cracking
Once you click on the Attack button , it will start collecting packets.
attack collect packer
WEP KEY FOUND
Once your IVS Packet count reaches 10000 or greater than that , its automatically crack the key and display it on the screen .
To see the database , click on the Key Database button .
WPA CRACKING : For WPA cracking the steps are same except you just need to specify the dictionary file (a file containing list of passwords) for the attack. |
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Right now net/http has Server.MaxHeaderBytes to limit request header size. Proposing an additional Server.MaxHeaderCount to limit total number of headers.
Granted that Server already has quite a number of tunable fields, none address the issue of DOS attacks that send a boatload of headers. Even when limiting total header size to 64k, an attacker can still send ~13k headers in a single request. This puts visible pressure on the GC as the number of malicious requests scale up. |
In this article I’m going to explain theory, prevention, some practical attacks and forensics related to the Man in the Middle (MitM) attacks to help you understand the risk to your privacy. Those are attacks used to eavesdrop your communication by having access to at least one part of the communication protocol.
Example, Alice sends a letter to Bob and uses Lucifer to deliver it, Lucifer has the MitM position which gives him the ability to read and change the message. Safety of the communication protocol depends Lucifer’s trustworthiness.
Understanding how internet works:
To understand MitM attacks on internet connection, first you have to learn how the internet works in it’s basic form. Three types of devices are used: clients, routers and servers. The most common protocol for client – server communication is Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). Majority of web browsing, emails, instant messaging etc. is implemented through HTTP.
When you type http://www.deepdotweb.com to your browser, client (you) sends a request for the webpage to the server. The packet (HTTP GET request) is forwarded through several routers to the server. The server then responds with a webpage that gets routed back to client where it is rendered on their screen. It is vital |
CISA adds 75 known exploited vulnerabilities to list, including new Cisco flaw
The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) last week added more than 70 vulnerabilities to its list of known exploited vulnerabilities that US agencies must fix by a specific date, indicating an increased risk if the flaws not be patched.
CISA added 34 bugs on Wednesday Catalog of known exploited vulnerabilitiesin addition to 20 on Tuesday and another 21 on Monday.
As with previous additions, many of the bugs added are several years old, with several Microsoft, Adobe, Oracle, IBM, Apple, and Linux bugs dating back more than eight years. This indicates that attackers are still exploiting these older bugs in unpatched systems.
Most bugs have a fix due date in the second full week of June, indicating an increased risk level if organizations continue to use the outdated software.
According to CISA, the bugs are added to the catalog of known exploited vulnerabilities based on evidence of active exploitation, where the vulnerabilities are a common attack vector for malicious actors. A US security policy mandates agencies to fix the vulnerabilities by a specific date to protect them from compromise, but CISA urges all organizations to mitigate their risk by patching software as soon as possible.
The oldest recently added vulnerabilities are 2010 bugs in Red Hat JBoss and Oracle Java Runtime Environment.
Only one 2022 vulnerability was part of the latest addition, an open port vulnerability in Cisco IOS XR tracked as CVE-2022-20821. Despite a medium severity level, Cisco urges IT admins to patch it immediately, as a remote attacker could use it to access the Redis instance running in the NOSi container and write to the Redis In-Memory database as well write arbitrary files to the container file system and retrieve information about the Redis database.
“Given the configuration of the sandbox container in which the Redis instance runs, a remote attacker would not be able to run remote code or abuse the integrity of the Cisco IOS XR Software host system,” Cisco says in one advisory.
The company says this affects Cisco 8000 series routers if they’re running a vulnerable version of Cisco IOS XR software and have the Health Check RPM installed and active. |
Secureworks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers recently identified a REvil ransomware version 2.02 sample in the wild. CTU analysis of the sample revealed several modifications that increase REvil’s ability to encrypt files and enable it to continue file encryption if the infected computer was turned off and restarted before the original encryption process was complete.
These modifications include:
- Implements resource conflict control: To successfully encrypt a file, REvil must first obtain a handle on the target file. Obtaining a handle on a file can fail for a number of reasons, including lack of permissions or resource conflicts. REvil 2.02 enhanced its encryption function by implementing logic that addresses resource conflicts to maximize total files encrypted. The KillResourceLock function leverages the Windows Restart Manager to kill processes or services that hold a resource lock on the file that REvil is attempting to encrypt. If the function resolves the resource conflict, REvil encrypts the target file. Otherwise, the file is skipped.
- Reimplements persistence and self-deletion: After removing the persistence and self-deletion functionalities from REvil 2.01, the malware authors reimplemented them in version 2.02. The persistence mechanism ensures that file encryption will continue if the infected computer was turned off and restarted before the original encryption process was complete. REvil’s persistence capability is controlled by the ‘arn’ configuration key value, which is a Boolean true or false value.
- Adds ‘-silent’ command-line argument to control ‘killshot’ functions: REvil 2.01 added logic to its main function that rendered killshot functions optional. These functions, which can kill blacklisted processes, delete blacklisted services, and delete shadow copies, could be enabled or disabled by setting a Boolean control variable to either true or false.
However, the malware author neglected to implement logic that sets this variable, so the killshot functions could not execute in REvil 2.01. REvil 2.02 addresses this oversight by implementing the ‘-silent’ command-line argument. If this argument is not passed, the Boolean control variable is set to true, which executes the killshot functions. If -silent is passed, the Boolean control variable is set to false, which skips the killshot functions.
- Updates registry keys: In REvil 2.02, the registry Run key used for persistence has the hard-coded value ‘mjOObKp0yy’. The registry key used to store encryption-related information was changed to SOFTWARE\Facebook_Assistant. The value names stored within this key also changed, consistent with the author’s pattern of renaming the registry values in each version.
The CTU research team has developed the Red Cloak countermeasures to detect activity associated with this threat and is investigating the feasibility of iSensor countermeasures. Third-party devices receive updated protection as it is released from the respective vendors and deployed by Secureworks device management security teams. |
A wireless test configuration requires the Wi-Fi Network SSID name and password, depending on the Wi-Fi authentication defined by the Wi-Fi Access Point or Wi-Fi Controller. The wireless test configuration can also include instructions for navigating through a captive portal. All captive portal types are supported but it does require capturing captive portal parameters (see also Wi-Fi Education for video content).
The Wi-Fi authentication types that are supported are as follows.
- WPA/WPA2 Personal (PSK)
- WPA/WPA2-Enterprise (EAP)
A wired test configuration only requires the circuit speed and a few other optional parameters to be defined for the test to execute properly. |
A countryside advanced a work of malware so robust that it could actually scouse borrow everything that’s going down on a computer without even being installed on the objective software itself. Instead, it is living on a router. It’s referred to as Slingshot and it was once not too long ago came upon via Kaspersky Labs. Incredibly, the malware is so robust and complex that it concealed in routers for 6 years ahead of in any case being noticed.
That’s most likely why a countryside is at the back of the assault. And whilst the inflamed routers which were known will probably be fastened by means of instrument updates, there’s no telling what number of machines can have been affected.
According to Ars Technica, the sophistication of Slingshot opponents in a similar way complex malware apps, together with Regin, a backdoor that inflamed Belgian telco Belgacom and different goals for years, and Project Sauron, a separate malware that still remained hidden for years.
The researchers don’t know exactly how Slingshot inflamed all of its goals, however in some instances the malicious app was once planted inside of MikroTik routers that Slingshot operators were given get entry to to.
“The malware is highly advanced, solving all sorts of problems from a technical perspective and often in a very elegant way, combining older and newer components in a thoroughly thought-through, long-term operation, something to expect from a top-notch well-resourced actor,” the researchers famous of their file.
After a router is inflamed, the malware would load a few “huge and powerful” modules on the objective’s computer. That features a kernel-mode module referred to as Cahnadr, and a user-mode module referred to as GollumApp. The two are then ready to improve every different to assemble knowledge, after which ship it out to the attacker. The malware was once almost certainly used for spying functions, because it was once ready to log desktop process and clipboard knowledge, in addition to accumulate screenshots, keyboard knowledge, community knowledge, passwords, and knowledge from USB gadgets.
The inflamed computer systems have been positioned essentially in Kenya and Yemen, but in addition in Afghanistan, Libya, Congo, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, and Tanzania. Targets incorporated folks in addition to executive organizations and establishments. Kaspersky didn’t determine the malware’s creators however stated that debug messages have been written in best possible English, suggesting builders spoke that language.
One extremely subtle factor the malware did to hide its life was once to make use of an encrypted digital document machine positioned in an unused a part of the arduous force. The malware additionally encrypted all textual content strings in more than a few modules at once to avoid safety merchandise. It even close down sure elements when forensic equipment have been in use on the software.
“Slingshot is very complex, and the developers behind it have clearly spent a great deal of time and money on its creation,” corporate researchers wrote. “Its infection vector is remarkable — and, to the best of our knowledge, unique.” |
wifite is created to to attack multiple WEP and WPA encrypted networks at the same time. This tool is customizable to be automated with only a few arguments and can be trusted to run without supervision. Features sorts targets by power (in dB); cracks closest access points first all WPA handshakes are backed up (to [...]
Tag Archive | "wifi-cracking"
Well WEP came down long ago, it was only a matter of time before the standard that succeeded it fell too – WPA. The big news last week was that WPA has been cracked finally, it’ll be discussed this week at the PacSec Conference. After the insecurity of WEP was exposed the majority of routers [...]
aircrack is an 802.11 WEP and WPA-PSK keys cracking program that can recover keys once enough data packets have been captured. It implements the standard FMS attack along with some optimizations like KoreK attacks, thus making the attack much faster compared to other WEP cracking tools. In fact, aircrack is a set of tools for [...]
WEP is a protocol for securing wireless LANs. WEP stands for “Wired Equivalent Privacy” which means it should provide the level of protection a wired LAN has. WEP therefore uses the RC4 stream to encrypt data which is transmitted over the air, using usually a single secret key (called the root key or WEP key) [...]
Wep0ff is new tool to crack WEP-key without access to AP by mount fake access point attack against WEP-based wireless clients. It uses combination of fragmentation and evil twin attacks to generate traffic which can be used for KoreK-style WEP-key recovery. This tool can be used to mount fake access point attack against WEP-based wireless [...] |
Distribution of the IcedID malware has recently spiked due to a new campaign that hijacks existing email conversation threads and injects hard-to-spot malicious payloads.
IcedID is a modular banking Trojan first spotted in 2017, used primarily to deploy second-stage malware such as other loaders or ransomware.
Its operators are believed to be initial access brokers who compromise networks and then sell access to other cybercriminals.
The ongoing IcedID campaign was discovered this month by Intezer researchers, who shared their findings with Bleeping Computer ahead of publication.
How the Attack Works
The primary conversation hijacking attack method is to take control of a key email account participating in a chat with the target and then send a phishing message designed to appear as a continuation of the chat thread.
So when the target receives a reply message with an attachment named and presented as something relevant to the previous discussion, the chances of suspecting fraud are minimized.
Intezer says there are clues pointing to threat actors targeting vulnerable Microsoft Exchange servers to steal credentials, as many of the compromised endpoints they found are publicly available and unpatched.
Additionally, in this campaign, analysts saw malicious emails sent from internal Exchange servers, using local IP addresses in a more trusted domain, and therefore unlikely to be flagged as suspicious.
The attachment sent to the targets is a ZIP archive containing an ISO file, which, in turn, contains an LNK file and a DLL file. If the victim double-clicks on the “document.lnk”, the DLL launches to configure the IcedID loader.
The IcedID GZiploader is stored in an encrypted form in the resource section of the binary, and after decoding it is placed in memory and executed.
The host then receives a fingerprint and basic system information is sent to C2 (your grocery store[.]top) via an HTTP GET request.
Finally, the C2 responds by sending a payload to the infected machine, although this step was not performed during the Intezer scan.
Links to the November 2021 campaign
While The Intezer report focuses on current and ongoing activity, it is unclear when this campaign began. It is possible that it started five months ago.
In November 2021, a Trend Micro report described a wave of attacks using ProxyShell and ProxyLogon vulnerabilities in exposed Microsoft Exchange servers to hijack internal email response chains and distribute documents containing malware.
The actors behind this campaign were believed to be “TR”, known to operate with a plethora of malware including Qbot, IcedID and SquirrelWaffle.
We have seen actor TR Distro (we call them ChaserLdr) using compromised Exchange servers vulnerable to Proxylogon/ProxyShell to send spam for about 1 week with artifacts indicating access dating back to earlyOCT. 1 time https://t.co/paoo2VM4sU
— Cryptolaemus (@Cryptolaemus1) November 1, 2021
All three malware have previously been involved in hijacking email threads to deliver malicious payloads [1, 2, 3, 4].
Intezer puts the TA551 threat group in the spotlight this time due to the use of regsvr32.exe for executing binary proxy DDL and password protected ZIP files.
The connection between these two groups of threats is however unclear, but it is not unlikely that there is an overlap or even an underlying connection.
Update your Exchange servers
We’re approaching the one-year milestone since Microsoft released fixes for the ProxyLogon and ProxyShell vulnerabilities, so applying the latest security updates is way overdue.
Failure to do so leaves your Exchange servers, business, and employees vulnerable to phishing actors, cyber espionage, and ransomware infections. |
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Previous targets have included organisations from the Financial, Construction, Advertising, and Healthcare sectors.
The Defence sector remains a potential target due to Chinese-state ambitions.
Severity level: High – This attack method is difficult to exploit, however, once successful, the exploit may result in significant sensitive data loss.
The Cheerscrypt ransomware has previously been affiliated with cyber-attacks against western private organisations and is highly likely linked to the Chinese state-sponsored group ‘Emperor Dragonfly’ also known as ‘Bronze Starlight’, based on the victims being targets of interest for the Chinese government and report correlation.
First detected in May 2022, Cheerscrypt is deployed as part of a chained attack made up of multiple malware strains including initial system exploitation by Night Sky, the deployment of a Cobalt Strike Beacon, then the post exploitation and encryption of data by the Cheerscrypt ransomware.
The chain attack targets VMware Horizon via the widely reported Log4j vulnerability (CVE-2021-44228) to execute PowerShell commands, enabling the deployment to Cobalt Strike and ultimately Cheerscypt. The technique of multiple malware swaps in a single attack is designed to confuse the defender and obfuscate the attacker’s identity.
Successful exploitation will enable attackers to breach secure networks, steal data, and encrypt devices. Data will be sold on the dark web for financial gain and to fund future attacks.
If compromised, detection will be obvious as data will be encrypted and a message will be displayed informing you of the breach and the attacker’s demands.
VMware Horizon servers on both Windows and Linux.
Containment, Mitigations & Remediations
Customers are strongly recommended to update all VMware Horizon instances to the latest patch to bring them in line with the latest defensive structure.
Additionally, customers are advised to use counter measures such as Microsoft Defender to detect and block malicious attempts and malware infiltration.
Indicators of Compromise
Known Night Sky hash:
Associated Night Sky IP:
Known Cobalt Strike hash:
Associated Cobalt Strike IP:
Known Cheerscrypt hash:
Associated Cheerscrypt IP:
There is a realistic possibility that targeted Chinese attacks against western organisations are conducted as ransomware to mask government-sponsored espionage under a guise of financial motivation. This then moves blame away from the Chinese government and the motive of intellectual property theft.
While there are no reports of this method of attack directly targeting the defence sector, the sector is almost certainly a top priority for the Chinese government and future attacks cannot be ruled out.
Chinese State-Sponsored ‘Emperor Dragonfly’
Night Sky tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs):
T1005 – Data from Local System
T1021.002 – Remote Services: SMB/Windows Admin Shares
T1027 – Obfuscated Files or Information
T1047 – Windows Management Instrumentation
T1048 – Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol
T1059.001 – Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell
T1059.004 – Command and Scripting Interpreter: Unix Shell
T1078 – Valid Accounts
T1190 – Exploit Public-Facing Application
T1486 – Data Encrypted for Impact
T1497 – Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion
T1567.002 – Exfiltration Over Web Service: Exfiltration to Cloud Storage
T1569.002 – System Services: Service Execution
T1570 – Lateral Tool Transfer
T1574.002 – Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading |
Recent News Articles
New malware hits Middle East computers
Security researchers say they have discovered another piece of espionage malware infecting computers and targeting sensitive organizations in the Middle East.
Kaspersky Lab in Russia and Seculert in Israel said the malware on more than 800 PCs operated by critical infrastructure companies, financial institutions and government agencies has been siphoning e-mails, passwords, computer files and nearby conversations, ArsTechnica.com reported Tuesday.
The researchers have dubbed the malware Madi or Mahdi, which in Islam is synonymous with Messiah, because of several code strings and handles used by the attackers.
The discovery evoked comparisons to the Flame malware used to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program, but both Kaspersky and Seculert said the malware contained amateur coding practices and relied on the gullibility of its victims, whereas Flame contained world-class cryptographic breakthroughs and other techniques that suggested state-sponsored developers.
“While we couldn’t find a direct connection between the campaigns, the targeted victims of Mahdi include critical infrastructure companies, financial services and government embassies, which are all located in Iran, Israel and several other Middle Eastern countries,” Seculert said. “It is still unclear whether this is a state-sponsored attack or not.”
Madi can log keystrokes, capture screenshots and steal any messages sent to or from a variety of widely used services, including Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, Skype or ICQ, the researchers said.
Copyright 2012 by United Press International |
Trend Micro and Europol in the fight against cyber attacks on ATMs
Trend Micro and the European Cybercrime Center (EC3) conducted by Europol published an extensive report on the current state of malware targeting ATMs. In the report entitled Cashing in on ATM Malware describes both physical and network attacks on ATMs using malware. In addition, the locations where such software is created are indicated.
Malware aimed at ATMs has changed significantly. In the past, physical access was required to infect the ATM. Currently, the bank's corporate network is used for this purpose. The report analyzes recent attacks carried out using the bank's network to steal money and credit card details from ATMs, irrespective of network segmentation. These attacks not only endanger the security of information that personally identifies and large sums of money, but also expose banks to violation of PCI standards.
"A report jointly developed by Trend Micro and the European Cybercrime Center shows that malware used in attacks on ATMs has evolved significantly, and the scope and scale of attacks has increased. Although cooperation between the industry and law enforcement agencies has significantly tightened, this type of crime is flourishing due to the substantial profits waiting for organized criminal groups involved in this procedure. The report assesses the development of this threat. I hope that it will serve as a signpost for the development of cooperation between the industry and law enforcement agencies, "said Steven Wilson, director of the European Center for Fighting Cybercrime.
In addition to the public version of the report, its special version has been made available only to law enforcement authorities, financial institutions and the IT security industry. It contains more details that allow private and public organizations to strengthen the protection of ATMs and network systems, and to prevent future attacks against financial institutions.
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We use Google Cloud Translation and Gengo API’s to translate articles with exception of our comparative tests. |
10:00 ET, 20 January 2014
Proofpoint discovered more Than 750,000 Phishing and SPAM Emails Launched From “Thingbots” Including Televisions, Fridge
Recently security researchers from Proofpoint uncovered a cyber attack against the Internet of Things (IoT), more than 100,000 Refrigerators, Smart TVs and other smart household appliances have been hacked to send out 750,000 malicious spam emails.
The nightmare comes true, dozens of Zombies are already in our house! In the past weeks I wrote about a Linux worm specifically designed to hit the Internet of Things, unfortunately this is just the beginning because according the forecasts the attacks will increase in the next months.
Up to now, such attacks were only drafted theoretically, this offensive id the proof that attacked based on smart devices are feasible as dangerous, millions of smart household appliances used as weapons of an attack, to identify them it has been coined the term ‘thingBots‘- Thing Robots or botnet of smart devices.
These networks of devices are privileged targets for cyber criminals that abusing their capabilities could launch cyber attacks in a large-scale.
“The attack that Proofpoint observed and profiled occurred between December 23, 2013 and January 6, 2014, and featured waves of malicious email, typically sent in bursts of 100,000, three times per day, targeting Enterprises and individuals worldwide. More than 25 percent of the volume was sent by things that were not conventional laptops, desktop computers or mobile devices; instead, the emails were sent by everyday consumer gadgets such as compromised home-networking routers, connected multi-media centers, televisions and at least one refrigerator.”
As explained by the experts at Proofpoint, cyber attacks based in the IoT are very difficult to mitigate, consider that IoT networks are composed of hundreds of thousands of devices, to each node is possible to assign a small task to do, like to send few dozens of requests to a target in a DDoS attack, or send-out a few spam emails. In this way their action will go unnoticed by overall effect could be dramatic as explained in the post.
“No more than 10 emails were initiated from any single IP address, making the attack difficult to block based on location — and in many cases, the devices had not been subject to a sophisticated compromise; instead, misconfiguration and the use of default passwords left the devices completely exposed on public networks, available for takeover and use.”
Internet of things devices are always online, still poorly protected and, often, misconfigured.
“Bot-nets are already a major security concern and the emergence of thingbots may make the situation much worse,” “Many of these devices are poorly protected at best and consumers have virtually no way to detect or fix infections when they do occur. Enterprises may find distributed attacks increasing as more and more of these devices come on-line and attackers find additional ways to exploit them.” said David Knight, General Manager of Proofpoint’s Information Security division.
It’s important to understand that the potentiality of such devices is unlimited, the fact that this time they have been used as “spammers” should not deceive us, thingBots could be used in an attack against a critical infrastructure from anywhere in the globe.
IDC estimated that than 200 billion smart devices will be connected via the Internet by 2021, as effect a growing number of IoT -based attacks will target Enterprises and government agencies.
Also in this case we must start to think to develop smart objects considering security by design.
(Security Affairs – Internet of Things, IoT) |
As a web developer and cybersecurity enthusiast, I’ve often encountered questions about the nature of malware files, particularly in the context of PHP. Malware, short for malicious software, is a broad category that encompasses various types of harmful code designed to infiltrate, disrupt, or damage computer systems. In this article, I aim to delve deep into the realm of PHP-based malware, shedding light on its existence, characteristics, and potential impact.
Understanding PHP-based Malware
PHP, a server-side scripting language, is widely used for web development due to its versatility and ease of integration with HTML. However, its open nature and powerful features also make it susceptible to exploitation by malicious actors. PHP-based malware refers to any malicious code or software that is written in PHP or targets PHP-based applications and servers.
Common forms of PHP-based malware include backdoors, web shells, and code injection scripts. These nefarious entities are often designed to compromise web servers, steal sensitive data, or facilitate unauthorized access to websites and web applications. One of the key attributes of PHP-based malware is its ability to camouflage itself within legitimate PHP files, making it particularly challenging to detect and mitigate.
Signs of PHP-based Malware
Identifying PHP-based malware can be a daunting task, as it often operates surreptitiously and attempts to blend in with authentic code. However, there are several telltale signs that can indicate the presence of PHP-based malware. These may include:
- Unexplained changes to PHP files or the addition of unfamiliar code snippets
- Anomalies in server logs, such as unusual file access patterns or unexpected network connections
- Unauthorized server file modifications or the creation of new, unauthorized files
- Abnormal server behavior, including unexpected redirects, slow performance, or unexplained server crashes
Remaining vigilant and routinely inspecting PHP files for irregularities are essential practices for thwarting potential PHP-based malware attacks.
Preventing PHP-based Malware Attacks
Given the prevalence and persistence of PHP-based malware, adopting robust preventive measures is paramount for safeguarding web infrastructure. Implementing the following practices can significantly enhance the resilience of PHP-based applications and servers:
- Regularly updating PHP versions and security patches to address known vulnerabilities
- Utilizing secure coding practices and input validation to mitigate the risk of code injection attacks
- Implementing web application firewalls (WAFs) and intrusion detection systems (IDS) to monitor and filter incoming PHP requests
- Conducting routine security audits and vulnerability assessments to identify and rectify potential points of entry for PHP-based malware
In conclusion, PHP-based malware represents a considerable threat to the integrity and security of web-based systems. Its insidious nature and potential ramifications underscore the necessity of proactive defense mechanisms and continuous vigilance. By staying informed about the characteristics of PHP-based malware and adhering to best security practices, we can fortify our digital environments against the pernicious effects of malicious PHP code. |
To install the necessary dependencies for any project without leaving my system in disarray, I recommend setting up a Python virtual environment first. For this, you will need Git and Python3 installed. To use the venv module on your machine, execute the following command: Sudo apt install python3-venv.
Let’s create a virtual environment, clone the hoaxshell repository, and install the mandatory Python packages with this command.
Verify that the hoaxshell repository works properly by executing the following command and accessing the help menu
Is it possible to craft reverse shell payloads with Hoaxshell?
Utilizing hoaxshell on our device, we can create some windows reverse shells that will be impossible to detect. To produce a conventional reverse shell payload and start an HTTP listener with hoaxshell (standard port 8080), execute the command below
This is what your terminal should display
On the Windows target box, executing a particular PowerShell command is necessary to acquire a reverse shell. To have an understanding of what the said command is executing, type in ‘raw payload’ into the hoaxshell prompt and press enter.
Within a PowerShell terminal window on the target Windows machine, copy and run the PowerShell payload.
Assuming no errors were thrown, you should have gotten a call-back to your reverse shell on your attacking machine. Hoaxshell confirms the payload was valid and you now have an uninterrupted connection – and most importantly, Microsoft Defender is oblivious to the malicious activity for the time being (which is awesome)!
With Hoaxshell, you can perform many awesome functions like encrypted transit, reconnect disconnected sessions, and send traffic via Ngrok or LocalTunnel. Explore these impressive capabilities on your own! There you have it: an invisible reverse shell compatible with the all-new Windows 11 OS. Time to hack! |
Wireless LANs : End to End
Get the definitive, real-world professional's guide to the hottest wireless LAN technologies available! "Wireless LANs End to End" is a comprehensive look at the technology from the standpoint of the IT Professional. The book goes above and beyond a simple re-hashing of the specification to provide practical implementation information on WLAN technology with special coverage of 802.11b and WLAN planning, configuration, implementation, troubleshooting and security considerations. Special sections on a WLAN site survey (industry leaders state the key to implementing an effective, efficient WLAN that performs the same as wired LAN is a site survey) and WLAN security are also included. This book is part of the "End to End" series, a new series dedicated to cutting-edge technologies designed to provide proven solutions, real-world tips and best practices. The "End to End series" takes a no "techno-babble" modular approach in explaining cutting edge wireless technology. Special features include case studies, real life implementations and wireless decision tree.
- Paperback | 384 pages
- 187.5 x 232.7 x 22.4mm | 603.29g
- 03 Apr 2002
- John Wiley & Sons Inc
- Hungry Minds Inc,U.S.
- Foster City, United States
About Walter R. Bruce
WALTER R. BRUCE III installed his first network in the Pentagon while working for the Judge Advocate General of the USAF. Since then, Bruce has worked in a variety of technological fields. For more than a dozen years he has been consulting and training computer users, and writing and publishing books about computer technology. RON GILSTER, A+, Network+, Server+, i--Net+, CCNA, is the author of more than a dozen bestselling computer books. He has over 35 years of IT experience most recently at a large regional wireless communications company.
Table of contents
Preface. Part I: Planning a Wireless Network. Chapter 1: How Wireless Networks Work. Chapter 2: A Short Course in IEEE 802. Chapter 3: Bluetooth, HomeRF, and HiperLAN/2. Chapter 4: Performing a Site Survey. Chapter 5: Selecting the Wireless Network Equipment. Chapter 6: Planning a Home Wireless Network. Part II: Installing a Wireless Network. Chapter 7: Installing Access Points. Chapter 8: Setting Up Client Stations. Chapter 9: Analyzing the Network Chapter 10: Installing a Home WLAN. Chapter 11: Planning and Installing a Campus WLAN. Part III: Managing a Wireless Network. Chapter 12: Ensuring Basic Wireless Security. Chapter 13: Implementing Enhanced Wireless Security. Chapter 14: A Short Course in Public Key Infrastructure. Chapter 15: Upgrading a Wireless Network. Part IV: Using Wi--Fi. Chapter 16: Using Wi--Fi at Work. Chapter 17: Using Wi--Fi at Home. Chapter 18: Using Wi--Fi on the Go. Part V: Connecting Sites with Wireless Technology. Chapter 19: Planning a Multisite Wireless Network. Chapter 20: Installing Site--to--Site Bridges and Antennas. Glossary. Index. |
Generic email credentials phishing (2022-06-02)
OverviewThe threat actor leverages a fake PDF document download theme, to acquire email login credentials.
In this phishing attempt, the threat actor sends an email saying that a PDF file is available to be downloaded. The phishing link (hxxps://sfo3[.]digitaloceanspaces[.][email protected]>) makes use of the recipient email address to fill the phishing form.
The phishing page detects the domain of the recepient’s email address, and adapts the logo accordingly on the left top-corner. For demonstration purposes, we used gmail.com.
A fake Symantec verification (yellow logo) is also shown to easier acquire the trust of a potential victim. No actual PDF file is available to be downloaded and the threat is limited to phishing only.
PreventionIf you are uncertain about the authenticity of an email, do not hesitate to contact the entity that seems to have sent you the email using a safe communication manner, using the phone for example (no phone number from the untrusted email must be used in order to verify the authenticity).
If you are working for the Luxembourgish government or are using any of the GOVCERT.LU services, it is important to forward phishing emails to us (using Reporting an incident or the Outlook button). This will allow us to take down phishing websites and protect members of our constituency. |
Madelyn Streisfeld - Teen Aspect - June 11th, 2022
Sure, war may seem like a timeless phenomenon. After all, it is possible to trace the first human conflicts back to the Stone Age, when cavemen utilized primitive technologies to convey individual or group superiority. We could acknowledge the use of spears in ancient Sparta, grenades in World War I, and atomic weaponry during the Cold War era, all of which illustrate how war - although a constant in our world - is ever-evolving.
The changes in war tactics reflect the level of mechanization experienced by a particular society. So while it may seem fitting to characterize conflict by physical battles, such a stereotype no longer reflects our daily interactions… most of which have gone digital. But just as mobile technology usage can pose a threat to individuals, cyberwar has added yet another dangerous and unprecedented layer to modern-day conflict.
As media professor Katharina Niemeyer and colleagues write for The Conversation, cyberwar “refers to all operations taking place on the internet, and to the physical infrastructure that supports it,” namely including attacking networks, jamming websites, and distributing new types of propaganda (2022).
The current Russian invasion of Ukraine is a case study for such tactics. Microsoft reported that before the incursion began in early 2022, Russian cyber actors attacked Ukrainian energy and IT providers with destructive computer viruses, impacting accessibility to devices and data (Bing & Pearson, 2022).
But cyber-warfare is unique in its implications, for it not only poses a threat to those on battlefields, as is the case with conventional warfare. Rather, its existence has created a contemporary total-war hybrid, in which every conflict is now capable of targeting private entities and civilians.
And far too often, the governments intended to protect individuals are incapable of shielding against these novel tactics. In a survey conducted by internet security firm NordVPN, only 19% of respondents revealed having faith in the United States’ ability to protect its citizens against cyber-warfare (2022).
Citizens can also be indirect targets of digital misconduct. Reuters journalist Raphael Satter described that on February 24, tens of thousands of satellite modems, including many found in Ukraine, underwent a “digital sabotage” that disabled communications (2022). Simultaneously, Russian forces began their invasion, leading accusations for the cyberattack to be placed on Putin. The loss of communications significantly impacted the coordination of Ukraine’s war effort, while also preventing Ukrainian citizens from accessing the internet and news sources at a time when they desperately needed both for safety.
What makes cyber-warfare even more alarming is that it can be difficult to trace the source. Rather than being limited to state-sponsored espionage activities, cyberwar includes hacktivism - digital security breaches by an individual or group with a political agenda. Thus, the proportion of a population that is now on the offensive has grown drastically, for war has become a private operation as well.
As young individuals who utilize automated technology more than any other previous generation, we are at the greatest risk of encountering the reverberations of cyberwar. Therefore, it is imperative that we comprehend the implications associated with conflict in the Digital Age. Computerization may be a valuable asset in combat, but we must learn how to navigate it and acknowledge that advancement does not always mean improvement.
Bahar, Z. (2022, May 3). Could Russia-Ukraine cyberattacks start a cyberwar in America? NordVPN. Retrieved from https://nordvpn.com/blog/could-russia-ukraine-cyberattacks-start-a-cyberwar-in-america/
Bing, C., Pearson, J. (2022, May 10). The cyber war between Ukraine and Russia: An overview. Reuters. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/factbox-the-cyber-war-between-ukraine-russia-2022-05-10/
Niemeyer, K., Trudel, D., Tworek, H., Silina, M., Matviyenko, S. (2022, March 28). The Russian invasion shows how digital technologies have become involved in all aspects of war. The Conversation. Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/the-russian-invasion-shows-how-digital-technologies-have-become-involved-in-all-aspects-of-war-179918
Satter, R. (2022, March 15). Satellite outage caused 'huge loss in communications' at war's outset - Ukrainian official. Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/world/satellite-outage-caused-huge-loss-communications-wars-outset-ukrainian-official-2022-03-15/ |
In this research piece, we explore BPFDoor — a backdoor payload specifically crafted for Linux in order to gain re-entry into a previously or actively compromised target environment, with insights on how evasion occurs within impacted systems.
The Elastic Security Research Team released a detailed report outlining technical details regarding the BLISTER launcher, a sophisticated malware campaign.
In this post, we detail a series of tactics for hunting with new data types and fields within Elastic and how to leverage Elastic Security to its fullest potential.
Provide executive-level details about CVE-2022-22965, a recently-disclosed remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability also known as “Spring4Shell”.
The latest organization under the microscope of the LAPSUS$ group is Okta. Threat hunt for the recent breach targeting Okta users using these simple steps in Elastic
Elastic Security discovered PHOREAL malware, which is targeting Southeast Asia financial organizations, particularly those in the Vietnamese financial sector. Learn more.
Elastic Security verified a data wiper malware campaign that is targeting Ukrainian systems. As this malware campaign is new, with more information being uncovered hourly, it is being referred to as HERMETICWIPER.
Elastic захищає від зловмисного програмного забезпечення для стирання даних, спрямованого на Україну: HERMETICWIPER
Elastic Security перевірила зловмисне програмне забезпечення для стирання даних, яке спрямоване на українські системи. Оскільки ця кампанія є новим явищем і ми щогодини дізнаємося щось нове, її називають HERMETICWIPER.
The Elastic Security Research team has identified new detection strategies to overcome the bypass methodologies used by adversaries to silently deploy malware onto an endpoint and elevate privileges without the end-user knowing. |
Espionage – it’s not just for James Bond type spies anymore. Cyber espionage is becoming an increasingly important part of global affairs, and a threat that companies and organizations handling large amounts of sensitive data are now faced with. Institutions like these are tempting targets because of the data they work with, and so attacks designed to steal data or manipulate them can give attackers significant advantages in various social, political and industrial theaters.
F-Secure Labs’ latest malware analysis focuses on CozyDuke – an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) toolkit that uses combinations of tactics and malware to compromise and steal information from its targets. The analysis links it to other APTs responsible for a number of high-profile acts of espionage, including attacks against NATO and a number of European government agencies.
CozyDuke utilizes much of the same infrastructure as the platforms used in these attacks, effectively linking these different campaigns to the same technology. “All of these threats are related to one another and share resources, but they’re built a little bit differently to make them more effective against particular targets”, says F-Secure Security Advisor Sean Sullivan. “The interesting thing about CozyDuke is that it’s being used against a more diverse range of targets. Many of its targets are still Western governments and institutions, but we’re also seeing it being used against targets based in Asia, which is a notable observation to make”.
CozyDuke and its associates are believed to originate from Russia. The attackers establish a beachhead in an organization by tricking employees into doing something such as clicking a link in an e-mail that distracts users with a decoy file (like a PDF or a video), allowing CozyDuke to infect systems without being noticed. Attackers can then perform a variety of tasks by using different payloads compatible with CozyDuke, and this can let them gather passwords and other sensitive information, remotely execute commands, or intercept confidential communications.
Just because threats like CozyDuke target organizations rather than individual citizens doesn’t mean that they don’t put regular people at risk. Government organizations, for example, handle large amounts of data about regular people. Attackers can use CozyDuke and other types of malware to steal data from these organizations, and then use what they learn about people for future attacks, or even sell it to cyber criminals.
The white paper, penned by F-Secure Threat Intelligence Analyst Artturi Lehtiö, is free and available for download from F-Secure’s website.
[ Image by Andrew Becraft | Flickr ]
Imagine weapons that are cheaper, more effective and easier to target than convention weapons. Best…
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A web application that makes it easy to run your pentest and bug bounty projects.
You can scan ports using nmap or masscan. The nmap is started with the following arguments:
nmap --top-ports 10000 -sV -Pn --min-rate 300 --max-retries 2 [ip]
The masscan is started with the following arguments:
masscan -p 1-65535 --rate 2000
- Leave notes to host, port or domain.
- Mark host or domain with tags.
- Search by any field related with host, port or domain (tags and notes are included). Regexp is available.
- Different types of sorting ara available on almost all dashboards.
- Run port scan for all hosts, hosts without port scan or custom list.
- Create tasks for subdomains search (every 2 hours, every 5 hours, every day or every week). You can also disable and enable them on demand using
- Different types of export are available.
- Notifications about the start and end of the scan, as well as about new found domains can be sent to Telegram. Update the
config.pywith your chat id and token.
Install from sources
NOTE 1: Change the paths for amass, findomain, nmap and masscan in
config.py before running commands. NOTE 2: The app must be started as root if you want masscan to work.
apt install python3 python-venv python3-pipgit clone https://github.com/ascr0b/PCWTcd PCWTpython3 -m venv envsource env/bin/activatepip3 install -r requirements.txtflask init-dbflask crontab addexport FLASK_APP=appflask run
The app is available at http://127.0.0.1:5000 |
DNS Exfiltration: The Light at the End of the DNS Tunnel
DNS data exfiltration is a way to exchange data between two computers without any direct connection. The data is exchanged through DNS protocol on intermediate DNS servers. During the exfiltration phase, the client makes a DNS resolution request to an external DNS server address. Instead of responding with an A record in response, the attacker’s name server will respond back with a CNAME, MX or TXT record, which allows a large amount of unstructured data to be sent between attacker and victim.
The Awake Security Platform autonomously detects such DNS exfiltration. In fact, while recently reviewing one such discovery in a customer environment, I came across a textbook case of DNS tunneling:
Figure 1: DNS Tunneling in customer environment
This was the only kind of traffic that matched this behavior in the environment, and looks incredibly similar to the DNS tunneling sample that was part of the Tolly Test we participated in this Summer:
Figure 2: DNS Tunneling via dnscat2 tool
At this point we have the knowledge about the behavior (DNS tunneling) and the domain:
Figure 3: Destination domain for DNS tunneling traffic
Figure 4: Diagram of how Canary Honeypots work
Perhaps my favorite piece of information in the document is the following paragraph, which is right in the Introduction section:
Answer solved. We’ve got a Canary honeypot regularly communicating back out to its infrastructure using TTPs cultivated and oft-used by attackers.
Why does it matter?
While the above detection is not actually malicious, it is a fantastic example of how true behavioral detection can help to find complex adversaries without the need for signatures. The underlying detection has been used to find all sorts of interesting behavior that would otherwise go completely unnoticed. And because of the power of in-product information, Awake takes the guesswork out of response.
If you liked what you just read, subscribe to hear about our threat research and security analysis.
Principal Threat Researcher
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A SECURITY flaw could allow hackers to eavesdrop on cellphone conversations made on Bluetooth-based wireless headsets, it was revealed this week.
All that is needed to exploit the flaw is a piece of equipment called a "Bluetooth sniffer", according to @Stake, the London-based security company that discovered it. The £3,000 device, which is normally used for testing, is a plug-in module for PCs that locks onto the Bluetooth signal.
When two devices begin to communicate via Bluetooth, they perform a "bonding" process by swapping identity information. It is during this authentication that the system is vulnerable, @Stake's Ollie Whitehouse says.
Connecting the phone and headset involves keying the PIN supplied with the headset into the cellphone. If the PIN is correct, the bonding process can begin. Whitehouse has discovered that by intercepting the radio signals communicated during this process the PIN can be identified. After that, it is relatively simple ...
To continue reading this article, subscribe to receive access to all of newscientist.com, including 20 years of archive content. |
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