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In the course of our research we uncovered the activity of a hacking group which has Chinese origins. This group was named “Winnti | ['T1083'] |
Pass Logger -> a credential stealer, used for stealing credentials stored in the Chrome, Firefox and Opera browsers | ['T1555.003'] |
Note: the NTRUEncrypt public key cryptosystem encryption algorithm (NTRU), is a lattice-based alternative to Rivest-Shamir-Adleman, known as RSA, and Elliptic-curve cryptography, or ECC, and is based on the shortest vector problem in a lattice | ['T1486'] |
On June 28, 2020, our Threat Fusion team identified a new file being downloaded by the Aisino Intelligent Tax product. Rather, this new sample’s sole mission is to delete GoldenSpy and remove any trace it existed. Including the deletion of registry entries, all files and folders (including the GoldenSpy log file), and finally, the uninstaller deletes itself with the following command: cmd.exe /c del /q C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Temp\AWX.exe. Note the “/c” which will terminate the Windows Command-line interface after the operation is completed and “/d” which will delete without asking permission or giving any notification | ['T1070.004'] |
A malware variant named Mal/Miner-C (also known as PhotoMiner) is infecting Internet-exposed Seagate Central Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices and using them to infect connected computers to mine for the Monero cryptocurrency | ['T1080'] |
The role of Torisma is to monitor for new drives added to the system as well as remote desktop connections. This appears to be a more specialized implant focused on active monitoring on a victim’s system and triggering the execution of payloads based on monitored events. The end objective of Torisma is executing shellcode on the victim’s system and sending the results back to the C2 | ['T1049'] |
PsExec is then used to launch PowerShell which uses the win32_service WMI class to retrieve services and the net stop command to stop these services. After Windows Defender is disabled and services have been stopped across the organization, PsExec is used to launch the WastedLocker ransomware itself, which then begins encrypting data and deleting shadow volumes | ['T1562.001', 'T1489', 'T1007'] |
The file named ‘lsass.exe’ was downloaded from win10-update[.]com via an HTTP request. The win10-update[.]com domain has been noted in open source as an indicator associated with Chafer threat operations. The lsass.exe file downloaded from this domain is a previously unreported python-based payload that we are currently tracking as MechaFlounder. We believe Chafer uses MechaFlounder as a secondary payload that the group downloads from a first-stage payload to carry out its post-exploitation activities on the compromised host | ['T1036.005'] |
Ryuk attempts to encrypt all mounted drives and hosts that have Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) entries (IP addresses) and it enumerates all mounted drives by calling GetLogicalDrives. For each mounted drive, Ryuk calls GetDriveTypeW to determine the drive’s type. To retrieve IP addresses that have ARP entries, Ryuk calls GetIpNetTable. It iterates through all entries and then tries to enumerate files and folders on the remote host and encrypt the files | ['T1057'] |
With this approach, the attacker ensures that there is no direct execution (the executable is executed thanks to scheduled tasks), there's no download of an additional payload, and finally, the author uses the fact that the docx format is an archive in order to include its executable (GravityRAT | ['T1053.005'] |
The macros are different. In the old campaign the actor used TextBoxes to store its data while in the new one the content has been base64 encoded within the document content. In the new campaign JavaScript files have been used to execute batch and PowerShell files. The new campaign uses Powershell and URLMON API calls to download the cab file while in the old campaign it used certutil to download the cab file. The new campaign has used two different UAC bypass techniques based on the victim’s OS while in the old one the actor only used the Token Impersonation technique. In the new campaign the actor has developed a new variant of Konni RAT that is heavily obfuscated. It also does not use FTP for exfiltration | ['T1059.003'] |
When the attackers need to send a file or command to the victim machine, they place them to the folder named d in the victim’s Dropbox folder. The malware retrieves this folder and downloads all its contents to the working folder | ['T1074.001', 'T1567.002'] |
A Python script was created for the purpose of automating this configuration file decoding process. The output of this script when run against the configuration file used by the first of the two Parliamentarian operation samples yielded the following data | ['T1059.006'] |
Conficker will copy itself with a random name into the system directory %systemroot%\system32 and register itself as a service | ['T1543.003'] |
The threat actor accomplished this by using administrative accounts to connect via SMB to targeted users, and then copy their Chrome profile directories as well as data protection API (DPAPI) data. In Windows, Chrome cookies and saved passwords are encrypted using DPAPI | ['T1021.002'] |
This time, the text is from the novel "The Brothers Karamazov" by Fyodor Dostoevsky (a Russian writer). The malicious document drops a Python interpreter and PoetRAT. The author made a few changes to the PoetRAT malware, though. First, the malware uses pyminifier to obfuscate the Python script and avoid detection based on string or YARA rules: The obfuscation is a base64 and an LZMA compression algorithm. Secondly, the author split the malware in a couple of different files. For example, the variables are stored in a "Constant.py" file containing the C2 server and the configuration. The most notable change is the protocol used to download and upload files | ['T1105'] |
Next, the loader fingerprints the Windows architecture. This is a crucial step because the loader needs to know what version of the backdoor to download (32-bit or 64-bit). Once the Windows architecture has been identified, the loader carries out the download | ['T1197'] |
Contacts an IP address / domain that was used to host a malicious document from a Lazarus previous campaign in 2017 - Same author appeared in these recent malicious documents that also appeared back in Lazarus 2017 campaigns - Uses the same malicious document structure and similar job recruitment ads as what we observed in past Lazarus campaigns - The techniques, tactics and procedures align with Lazarus group’s interest in crypto currency theft | ['T1001.003'] |
Check the email sender, subject, and body for anything suspicious before downloading and opening email attachments. Check the file extension of the attached file and make sure it is the intended file format. Avoid activating macro for any attached Microsoft Office files, especially for emails that request macro activation using an image of the body of the opened file or those that don’t show anything. Subtle changes to a popular URL can be one indicator of malicious content | ['T1204.002'] |
1) Checks if the user has Administrator privilege 2) Drops the Cobalt Strike Stager in debug or “%TEMP%” directory as “tmp_FlVnNI.dat” depending on the user privilege 3) Opens the decoy Word document 4) Locates the InstallUtil.exe and its installed version 5) Copies “schtasks.exe” to “%TEMP%” directory and renames it to “wtask.exe” 6) Creates Scheduled tasks with the name “Security Script kb00855787” 7) Renames “wscript.exe” into “winwsh.exe” 8) Runs the scheduled task to execute the Cobalt Strike Stager 9) C2 communication | ['T1053.005'] |
The information that the malware gets from the victim machine can be the user name, the machine name, the domain where the machine belongs or, if not, the workgroup, the product name (operating system name), etc | ['T1082', 'T1082'] |
While the decoy in Figure 2 is displayed, the macro will search the document for the delimiter ###$$$ and write the base64 encoded text that follows this delimiter to the file %APPDATA%\Base.txt. OopsIE Trojan Analysis The OopsIE Trojan delivered in these attacks is packed with SmartAssembly and further obfuscated with ConfuserEx v1.0.0. By using the InternetExplorer application object, all C2 related requests will look as if they came from the legitimate browser and therefore will not contain any anomalous fields within the request, such as custom User-Agents. As seen in the above request, the Trojan will generate a URL for its beacon with the following structure: http://<c2 domain>/chk. hex(Environment.UserName/Environment.MachineName)> The Trojan will issue a request to this URL to check (hence the chk string in the URL) to see if the C2 server has a command for the Trojan to run. The C2 server will respond to the Trojan’s request by echoing the value <hex(Environment.UserName/Environment.MachineName)> if it wishes to provide additional commands. If the C2 server does not respond with the appropriate echoed data, the Trojan will create a file named srvCheckresponded.tmp in the SpecialFolder.CommonApplicationData folder and write nothing to it before exiting. If the C2 server provides the appropriate echoed data in the response, the Trojan attempts to determine what commands the C2 wishes to run by issuing a request to the following URL: http://<c2 domain>/what. hex(Environment.UserName/Environment.MachineName)> After issuing the what command, the Trojan will parse the C2's response for the string Oops, which the Trojan will treat as the C2 making a mistake and will exit. Otherwise, the Server will respond with a command followed by a set of parameters, split up by the delimiter <>: [command]<>[parameters for command in hexadecimal format] The available commands are | ['T1105', 'T1030'] |
Update the RAT and Keylogger remotely - Set an autostart JavaScript to run on RAT startup - A Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) for C2 resiliency - If the user has admin permissions, it deletes shadow copies using vssadmin.exe | ['T1568.002'] |
The wiper is relatively small in size and dynamically resolves most of the APIs it uses. Before starting any file destruction, it checks to ensure that the machine is not a domain controller. If the machine is a domain controller, it stops execution. Pseudo-code: CaddyWiper checking for the Domain Controller role of the machine. If the system is not a domain controller, the wiper will destroy files on "C:\Users," followed by wiping of all files in the next drive letter until it reaches the "Z" drive. This means that the wiper will also attempt to wipe any network mapped drive attached to the system | ['T1082'] |
While we do not have data supporting targeting information or telemetry, we know the document was created in January 2018 and likely used in an attack around that time frame. The QUADAGENT payload dropped by the delivery document had the filename AdobeAcrobatLicenseVerify.ps1 and used acrobatverify[.]com for its C2. We used this QUADAGENT payload when testing the Invoke-Obfuscation tool mentioned in this blog. QUADAGENT Analysis The final payload delivered in all three attack waves is a PowerShell downloader referred to by other research organizations as QUADAGENT. The downloaders in these attacks were configured to use both rdppath[.]com and cpuproc[.]com as their C2 servers. When communicating with its C2 server, the downloaders use multiple protocols, specifically HTTPS, HTTP or DNS, each of which provide a fallback channel in that order. For instance, the downloader will first attempt to communicate with its C2 server using an HTTPS request. If that HTTPS request is not successful, the downloader will issue an HTTP request. Lastly, if the HTTP request is not successful, the downloader will fallback to using DNS tunneling to establish communications. The downloader will use the filename of the script (ex | ['T1071.001'] |
As soon as the user enabled the macro, a robust Visual Basic Application (VBA) script began to execute. First, it would query Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to check if any of the following applications were running | ['T1047'] |
Note that .hwp is the extension used by Hangul Word Processor from Hangul Office, which is very popular in South Korea | ['T1036.005'] |
We believe that the source of all these stolen certificates could be the same Winnti group. Either this group has close contacts with other Chinese hacker gangs, or it sells the certificates on the black market in China | ['T1553.002'] |
Summary . The following knowledgebase will explain the uses of Net commands in Windows Operating Systems. More information . Net Commands On Windows Operating Systems . The following Net Commands can be used to perform operations on Groups, users, account policies, shares, and so on. NET . The "Net Accounts" command is used to set the policy settings on local computer, such as Account policies and password policies. This command can't be used on domain controller. When you type Net Accounts, you will see the default settings of the Account Lockout policy and Password Policy in local computer show as: The above settings displayed as per the role of the computer. Community Solutions Content Disclaimer . Microsoft corporation and/or its respective suppliers make no representations about the suitability, reliability, or accuracy of the information and related graphics contained herein. User Account Control and remote restrictions - Windows Server Describes User Account Control (UAC) and remote restrictions in Windows Vista. auditpol get Reference article for the auditpol get command, which retrieves the system policy, per-user policy, auditing options, and audit security descriptor object. wevtutil Reference article for wevtutil, which lets you retrieve information about event logs and publishers. Manage cookies - Previous Version Docs - Blog - Contribute - Privacy & Cookies - Terms of Use - Trademarks - © Microsoft 2022 - Summary - More information - - - - Manage cookies - Previous Version Docs - Blog - Contribute - Privacy & Cookies - Terms of Use - Trademarks - © Microsoft 2022 | ['T1087.002'] |
In this blog, we described how Redaman has become more effective by hiding dynamic C&C server addresses inside the Bitcoin blockchain | ['T1102.001'] |
As part of our investigation, we monitored exactly what the cybercriminals did on an infected PC. In particular, they they downloaded an auxiliary program ff._exe to the Config.Msi folder on the infected machine | ['T1105'] |
Looking at the binaries for SUNBURST and TEARDROP, we’ve learned that even this wildly successful operation had its rough edges. Far from a worry-free power trip, the attackers were wary all the while of having their activity seen at all, never mind recognized for what it was; extensive blacklists of domains and processes had to be created to make sure of that | ['T1027'] |
Email* - - * I agree to provide my email address to “AO Kaspersky Lab” to receive information about new posts on the site. I understand that I can withdraw this consent at any time via e-mail by clicking the “unsubscribe” link that I find at the bottom of any e-mail sent to me for the purposes mentioned above. I agree to provide my email address to “AO Kaspersky Lab” to receive information about new posts on the site. I understand that I can withdraw this consent at any time via e-mail by clicking the “unsubscribe” link that I find at the bottom of any e-mail sent to me for the purposes mentioned above | ['T1204.001'] |
This turned out to be the best solution, as the Cobalt group set up a controlled botnet in the bank's network which was very difficult to track and even harder to stop. In october 2016 Group-IB published the report about the Cobalt group. Initially the Cobalt group focused on jackpotting ATMs: they launched a program that sent commands directly to the dispenser to issue cash. Network penetration In all cases investigated by Group-IB, the Cobalt group used a set of spear phishing emails to gain initial access to the corporate infrastructure. However, some of the email addresses belong to employees that no longer work at the organization, which means that the Cobalt group likely uses out-of-date mailing lists. For organizations that perform timely updates of their systems and adhere to strict security policies, the Cobalt group employs another method to deliver malicious code through emails with Word documents containing a malicious macro. When opening the document, the user must click on the "Enable content" button, which enables macros (fig. 5 Example of an email message with a Word document, which, when opened, requires the user to click on the "Enable content" button to enable a malicious macro. 6 Example of a message sent by attackers from a domain whose name is similar to the name of a real domain . As soon as the attachment is launched and the malicious code is executed, the Cobalt Strike payload is loaded in the memory. In addition, Cobalt Strike enables users not to expose a fragment of memory allocated in the context of another process, the RWX (Read, Write, Execute) attributes, which often reveal injected code | ['T1059.005'] |
The Zip archive is encrypted with an unknown password, but we know it contains two files named joboffer.chm and thumb.db. The joboffer.chm file is a compiled HTML file that we believe loads and executes the ‘thumb.db’ file as a payload, but we cannot be absolutely sure as we do not have the password required to extract the files from the archive | ['T1218.001'] |
Recently, after looking at the difference between 0vercl0ck’s proof of concept and the real deal, a friend asked me “Why does PowerLoader go to all the trouble of using ROP chains instead of just executing the shellcode like 0vercl0ck does. PowerLoader gets the malicious code into the process by opening an existing, shared section already mapped into explorer, removing the need to allocate heap space or overwrite process memory. By opening “Shell_TrayWnd” and calling SetWindowLong, PowerLoader is able to set a variable used by the window procedure to point to a specific address in its shellcode. The read part won’t trigger DEP (Data Execution Prevention), if the section is not executable (in later versions of windows it is execute-protected), however if EAX points to an address inside the section, DEP will be triggered. Well how does one get from KiUserApcDispatcher to code execution, without executing the non-executable shellcode, I hear you ask. Next it pops the return address into the EAX and then calls it, this results in execution being transferred back to the Window Procedure. The sequences are instruction within the executable regions of explorer’s memory, their purpose is to perform certain operations as PowerLoader can’t execute any of its own code yet, due to the section being execute-protected. 00100E28 points to some code in explorer that executes the instruction “STD” followed by “RET”, As a result the instruction underlined in red will result in the direction flag being set and execution being returned to the Window Procedure. Well these bytes were found, in this case inside some random shell32 function (it doesn’t matter). Now the pointer doesn’t point to the start of the function, it points somewhere in the middle, as a result, only the bytes in the red box are executed. Remember: because all addresses points to executable code within explorer address space, and they are called using a pointer, no code in the shellcode is actually executed, thus resulting in no nasty DEP errors | ['T1055.011'] |
Then calls the fcL4qOb4 function to set the scheduled task and disguise as the one used by Google | ['T1036.004', 'T1053.005'] |
This module has been described before in the article here. The first instructions in the main function hide the console window from the user. Afterward, the module will delete old "sft" files assuming they were already exfiltrated. After a pause of 6,500 milliseconds, it will start its search for the targeted files | ['T1564.003'] |
Once in the folder, this property list (plist) file will launch the CrashReporter program with the Maintain parameter on system load as Root for every user. Because the LaunchDaemon will not run automatically after the plist file is moved, the postinstall script launches CrashReporter with the Maintain parameter and runs it in the background (Create or Modify System Process: Launch Daemon [T1543.004 | ['T1569.001'] |
Researchers also observed that the backdoor downloads and executes the Cobalt Strike pentesting and post-exploitation toolkit on the victim's machine within some period of time after the infection. By deploying Cobalt Strike, it is clear that this stealthy backdoor is being used to gain a foothold in corporate networks so that ransomware can be deployed, data can be stolen, or network access could be sold to other threat actors | ['T1105'] |
Stop the running xmlprov service - Copy dropped xmlprov.dll and xmlrov.ini into the system32 directory and delete them from the current directory - Check if xmlProv service is installed or not and if it is not installed create the service through svchost.exe - Modify the xmlProv service values including type and binpath - Add xmlProv to the list of the services to be loaded by svchost - add xmlProv to the xmlProv registry key - Start the xmlProv service | ['T1112'] |
We found malicious code injected into a JavaScript library provided by Volusion to their client shops. The injected code loaded another JavaScript stored on a Google Storage service. The loaded script is almost a direct copy of a normal JavaScript library but has a credit card skimmer carefully integrated. When customers submit their payment information, the skimmer will copy and send the personal information and credit card details to an exfiltration server belonging to the attackers | ['T1059.007'] |
HAFNIUM has previously compromised victims by exploiting vulnerabilities in internet-facing servers, and has used legitimate open-source frameworks, like Covenant, for command and control. Once they’ve gained access to a victim network, HAFNIUM typically exfiltrates data to file sharing sites like MEGA | ['T1567.002'] |
We believe that the threat actors behind the Frankenstein campaign are moderately sophisticated and highly resourceful. The actors' preference for open-source solutions appears to be part of a broader trend in which adversaries are increasingly using publicly available solutions, possibly to improve operational security. This report outlines the various anti-detection techniques used throughout the Frankenstein campaign. Some of these techniques included checking to see if any analysis tools, such as Process Explorer, were running in the background and determining whether the sample was inside of a virtual machine. The threat actors also used different types of encryption in order to protect data in transit | ['T1497.001'] |
Then it uses a net use command to connect to the network drive. It then checks, in a loop, as shown in Figure 12, if a command is available. It writes the command results in another OneDrive subfolder and encrypts it with the XOR key 0xAA | ['T1027'] |
As part of this research, I reached out to Benjamin Delpy, author of Mimkatz, and requested he add “SID History” to Mimikatz forged Kerberos tickets. The June 28th version of Mimikatz now includes the capability to include arbitrary SIDs in SID History on forged tickets. When a user is authenticated, the SIDs of every security group the user is a member of is added to the user’s Kerberos ticket, as well as any SIDs in the user’s SID History. Golden Tickets . Golden Tickets are forged Ticket-Granting Tickets (TGTs), also called authentication tickets. In other words, in a mult-domain AD forest, if the domain the Golden Ticket was created in doesn’t contain the Enterprise Admins group, the Golden Ticket won’t provide admin rights to other domains in the forest. The standard Golden Ticket is limited to the child domain it was created in, so now we add SID History to the equation… . Golden Ticket + SID History = WINNING. Things get more interesting once Mimikatz supports SID History in Golden Tickets (and Silver Tickets) since any group in the AD Forest can be included and used for authorization decisions. In order to support my research into how to expand access using SID History in Kerberos tickets across trusts (both intra-forest and external), I reached out to Benjamin Delpy in late June and requested SID History be added. Using the latest version of Mimikatz, we can now add SID History to the Golden Ticket for the Forest Enterprise Admins group. In summary, Golden Tickets can now be used to compromise any domain in the AD Forest once a single one is compromised | ['T1134.005'] |
In this campaign, Earth Vetala threat actors used spearphishing emails and lure documents against organizations within the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Azerbaijan. The phishing emails and lure documents contain embedded URLs linking to a legitimate file-sharing service to distribute archives containing the ScreenConnect remote administrator tool | ['T1204.001'] |
Capabilities of the NETWIRE backdoor include key logging, reverse shell, and password theft. The backdoor uses a custom encryption algorithm to encrypt data and then writes it to a file created in the ./LOGS directory | ['T1074.001', 'T1560.003'] |
The ScreenUtil module, which was first reported in 2017, takes a screenshot of the current user's desktop. All variants analyzed by CTU researchers were hard-coded to drop the captured image files to %APPDATA%\Update\Tmp | ['T1113'] |
If the ‘-p’ parameter has been passed into the command line, the loader proceeds to download the Team9 backdoor directly from the command and control server. One notable addition is the process injection (hollow process injection) when the backdoor has been successfully downloaded and decrypted. The loader injects the backdoor to one of the following processes | ['T1055.012', 'T1055.013'] |
Log keystrokes and the titles of open windows - Gather clipboard data and system information - Steal printer information and any documents that were sent to be printed - Record audio - Capture screenshots and webcam photos | ['T1120'] |
The UprotectData() method treats the first two bytes of the Base64 decoded value as a two-byte XOR key | ['T1573.001', 'T1560.003'] |
We had previously observed this same IP scanning for TCP port 7001 throughout May 2018. This was potentially a scan for Oracle WebLogic servers, which listens on TCP port 7001 by default. In both our samples, as well as the ones that Morpheus Labs described, the hard-coded password was not only identical, but also located at the same offset | ['T1046'] |
The server uses folders in the current directory to store information sent and received from WellMess backdoors and the folder layout is shown in Figure 2. Additionally, the server uses a private key and certificate located in the current working directory during mutual TLS connections | ['T1573.002'] |
An uptick in activity from GRIM SPIDER, a subgroup of the criminal enterprise CrowdStrike Intelligence tracks as WIZARD SPIDER, has led to the identification of consistent actions employed to carry out their attacks. As part of their initial compromise — usually as a download from a spam email — they gain a foothold with their modular TrickBot malware, which was developed and is principally operated by WIZARD SPIDER. Once TrickBot is executed, new enumeration modules are downloaded onto the compromised machine to facilitate WIZARD SPIDER’s spread in search of credentials with the aim of gaining access to the domain controller. The criminal actors use RDP to perform lateral movement and explore the victim environment, with an end result of gaining access to the domain controller. Once this access has been achieved, GRIM SPIDER is able to deploy the Ryuk ransomware to the entire network. These observations come from system log data, CrowdStrike Falcon® sensor telemetry, and the output of the Falcon Forensic Collector (a customized version of CrowdStrike’s freely distributed community tool, CrowdResponse | ['T1570'] |
As shown in Figure 11, after compromising an initial victim's system (patient 0), the threat actors use the Baidu search engine to search for the victim's organization name. They then identify the Exchange server and attempt to install the OwaAuth web shell. If the OwaAuth web shell is ineffective because the victim uses two-factor authentication for webmail, the adversaries identify other externally accessible servers and deploy ChinaChopper web shells. Within six hours of entering the environment, the threat actors compromised multiple systems and stole credentials for the entire domain | ['T1003.002', 'T1003.004', 'T1003.001'] |
Displays and modifies entries in the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) cache, which contains one or more tables that are used to store IP addresses and their resolved Ethernet or Token Ring physical addresses. Used without parameters, arp displays help | ['T1018'] |
We found that a domain admin account was compromised and the Active Directory audit tool PingCastle was run. Using the domain admin, the actor was able to compromise several other accounts and execute malicious services and persistence mechanisms, namely SDBbot RAT Loaders | ['T1078.002'] |
KillDisk is designed to run with high privileges, this time it registers itself as a service under Plug-And-Play Support name | ['T1036.004'] |
Static Kitten is distributing at least two URLs that deliver two different ZIP files that are themed to be relevant to government agency employees. The URLs are distributed through phishing emails with lure and decoy documents. An example lure is shown in Figure 2 below | ['T1204.001'] |
The attackers also used a malicious tool that they named BCS-server. This tool allows them to open a tunnel into an internal network and then this tunnel can be used to send and receive data between the C&C server and even non-infected computers in the network. The main idea of this tool is based on the same principles as the XTUNNEL malware used by the Sednit group | ['T1140'] |
The recipient clicked the link and proceeded to download and open a malicious HTML executable file, which in turn loaded content from a C&C server via an embedded iframe | ['T1204.001'] |
The initial CVE-2019-19781 exploitation activity on January 20 and January 21, 2020, involved execution of the command ‘file /bin/pwd’, which may have achieved two objectives for APT41. Second, it may return architecture-related information that would be required knowledge for APT41 to successfully deploy a backdoor in a follow-up step | ['T1083'] |
Cadelspy compresses all of the stolen data into a .cab file and uploads it to the attacker’s C&C servers | ['T1560'] |
HAWKBALL is a backdoor that communicates to a single hard-coded C2 server using HTTP. The C2 server is obtained from the decrypted config file, as shown in Figure 5 | ['T1071.001'] |
PowerStallion is a lightweight PowerShell backdoor using Microsoft OneDrive, a storage service in the cloud, as C&C server | ['T1102.002'] |
26, 2018) used a macro-based document that dropped a VBS file and an INI file. The INI file contains the Base64 encoded PowerShell command, which will be decoded and executed by PowerShell using the command line generated by the VBS file on execution using WScript.exe | ['T1140'] |
For alerts raised either by specific threat intelligence tied to activity groups or by more generic suspicious behaviors, Windows Defender ATP provides rich, visualized technical context. In the screenshots below, Windows Defender ATP clearly presents the Winnti installation where an installer drops a DLL to disk (Figure 5), loads the DLL using rundll32 (Figure 6), sets the DLL as a service (Figure 7), and saves a copy of itself in C:\Windows\Help (Figure 8 | ['T1218.011'] |
It continues to perform a number of checks for installed security products on the victim machine. The following security platforms are queried by checking entries within the HKLM\Software\ registry path | ['T1518.001'] |
Earth Vetala used spearphishing emails with embedded links to a legitimate file-sharing service to distribute their malicious package | ['T1583.006'] |
Emails dating more than three years prior to malware execution have been included in the collected EmailStorage folder, meaning that there may not be a date limit for the email enumerator. There is a lack of keywords or other limiting pattern by which specific email messages in local mailboxes were targeted for exfiltration. Kroll has identified instances where specific email messages were deleted within the EmailStorage folder. In some instances, the entire EmailStorage folder is deleted once messages have all been exfiltrated. Based on observed cases, there was no evidence that attachments were included in the collected data. Kroll collaborators at the National Cyber Forensics Training Alliance (NCFTA) observed Qakbot samples sending SMTP traffic indicative of outbound spam thread hijackings | ['T1074.001'] |
The experience of dealing with Emotet shows that it will be time well spent. We always recommend that clients adopt a policy that forces users to create passwords that they can remember, but that are hard to guess | ['T1110.001'] |
In the past we have seen others techniques that used Bitcoin blockchain to hide their C&C server IP address, but in this blog we will share an analysis of the new technique | ['T1568'] |
When run, GoldMax decodes (Base64) and decrypts (AES-256) the configuration data to reveal a custom data structure comprised of the following dynamically generated and hardcoded values (delimited by | ['T1140'] |
The first stage logic is performed by ‘mklgsecondary’ which serves the purpose of downloading a file named ‘chrome.txt’ from a C2 server using the BITS utility. The downloader modifies the Chrome shortcut using the same method previously described for the Telegram variant. The downloaded PE file (‘chrome.txt’/’mklgchrome’) gets executed each time the user starts Chrome, thereby running the real Chrome application as well as executing the MarkiRAT payload | ['T1197', 'T1105'] |
In the implementation of Flagpro v1.0, if a dialog titled “Windows セキュリティ” is displayed when Flagpro accesses to an external site, Flagpro automatically clicks OK button to close the dialog. This handling also works when the dialog is written Chinese and English. It can indicate the targets are Japan, Taiwan, and English-speaking countries. Flagpro v2.0 checks whether both username and password are filled in a dialog as an additional feature before clicking the OK button | ['T1614.001'] |
Zirconium is using what are referred to as web bugs, or web beacons, tied to a domain they purchased and populated with content. Although the domain itself may not have malicious content, the web bug allows Zirconium to check if a user attempted to access the site | ['T1566.002'] |
Once macros were enabled on the target system, the malicious macros created two named scheduled tasks as persistence mechanisms for two backdoors on the infected system. The first named scheduled task launched an application whitelisting script protection bypass to execute a COM scriptlet that dynamically downloaded the first backdoor from APT32’s infrastructure and injected it into memory. The second named scheduled task, loaded as an XML file to falsify task attributes, ran a JavaScript code block that downloaded and launched a secondary backdoor, delivered as a multi-stage PowerShell script. In most lures, one scheduled task persisted an APT32-specific backdoor and the other scheduled task initialized a commercially-available backdoor as backup | ['T1053.005', 'T1218.010'] |
Comnie Malware Family Comnie uses the RC4 algorithm in multiple locations both to obfuscate strings used by the malware, as well as for network communication. More information about how Comnie handles identified security products may be found in the technical analysis in the Appendix. Comnie is able to achieve persistence via a .lnk file that is stored within the victim’s startup path. When originally run, Comnie will convert itself from an executable file to a DLL and will write this newly created DLL to the host machine’s %APPDATA% directory. The built-in Windows utility rundll32.exe is then used to load this DLL by the original .lnk file. Unit 42 has observed a total of two variants of Comnie. One of the ways the variants differ is in how they obtain their command and control (C2) information. Both variants make use of third-party online services in an attempt to prevent DNS based blocking of their first stage communications. In older variants, Comnie was found to look for the ‘++a++’ markers. The example C2s used by older variants of Comnie demonstrates this | ['T1102.002'] |
To inject the OpenSSH server configuration directly into memory, Ebury parses the sshd binary’s code section mapped in the same process looking for two different functions. If it fails, it downgrades security features by disabling SELinux Role-Based Access Control and deactivating PAM modules. When one of the functions is successfully resolved, Ebury will use this when the backdoor is used to tamper with sshd‘s configuration | ['T1556.003', 'T1562.001'] |
The Gorgon Group Crew Breakdown Finding accessible directories, in combination with their other operational security failures, made it easy to start connecting the dots on Gorgon Group members. 360 and Tuisec already identified some Gorgon Group members. In addition to Subaat, we counted an additional four actors performing attacks as part of Gorgon Group. While it’s not known if the attackers physically reside in Pakistan, all members of Gorgon Group purport to be in Pakistan based on their online personas. fudpages One member of Gorgon Group- we're calling ‘fudpages’, was found during this campaign activity based on their utilization of shared infrastructure. We noticed that this document pulls down additional malware from a C2 also being used in attacks by other Gorgon Group members. Additionally, this document communicates to a relatively new piece of C2 infrastructure- umarguzardijye[.]com, which is hosted on 91[.]234[.]99[.]206 | ['T1105'] |
In this wave of attacks, Emotet trojan spreads by emails that lure victims into downloading a Christmas-themed Word document, which contains a macro that executes a PowerShell script to download a malicious payload. Commands in the macro are heavily obfuscated for defense evasion | ['T1027'] |
Icons were often folders, meant to trick targets into thinking they were opening a shortcut to a folder | ['T1036'] |
The main code is run in a separate thread: every 10 minutes, the application contacts the C&C server motivation[.]neighboring[.]site and passes it the computer's identifier in the User-Agent string. The identifier is a SuperFastHash of the system volume serial number and the name of the computer | ['T1082', 'T1029'] |
One significant change between DEATHRANSOM and FIVEHANDS is the use of a memory-only dropper, which upon execution, expects a command line switch of -key followed by the key value necessary to perform decryption of its payload. The payload is stored and encrypted with AES-128 using an IV of “85471kayecaxaubv”. The decrypted FIVEHANDS payload is immediately executed after decryption. To date, Mandiant has only observed encrypted droppers with a common imphash of 8517cf209c905e801241690648f36a97 | ['T1140'] |
Before executing the main payload, the QakBot loader will first test the infected system to see if it is a good candidate for infection. Figure 5 below shows a high-level execution flow of the QakBot loader | ['T1518.001', 'T1518.001', 'T1497.001'] |
NCCIC observed multiple methods used by NotPetya to propagate across a network. The first and—in most cases—most effective method, uses a modified version of the Mimikatz tool to steal the user’s Windows credentials. The cyber threat actor can then use the stolen credentials, along with the native Windows Management Instrumentation Command Line (WMIC) tool or the Microsoft SysInternals utility, psexec.exe, to access other systems on the network. Another method for propagation uses the EternalBlue exploit tool to target unpatched systems running a vulnerable version of SMBv1. In this case, the malware attempts to identify other hosts on the network by checking the compromised system’s IP physical address mapping table. Next, it scans for other systems that are vulnerable to the SMB exploit and installs the malicious payload. Refer to the malware report, MIFR-10130295, for more details on these methods | ['T1210'] |
Tracing the origin of the hidden .mina file showed that it is a copy of an included resource, renamed SubMenu.nib, from the application bundle and where the main backdoor functions were contained. It also has the same links to Lazarus’ Windows and Linux predecessors: the presence of the hardcoded strings c_2910.cls and k_3872.cls. Both strings were previously used during C&C communication to the domain thevagabondsatchel[.]com as the sample storage of the cybercriminal group, as reported by 360 Netlab researchers | ['T1027', 'T1564.001'] |
The threat actor in this case hosted the MSI file on GitHub using a spoofed file extension to look like a PDF | ['T1218.007'] |
The macro then creates a scheduled task named SecurityAssist that runs after waiting one minute. OopsIE Trojan Analysis The OopsIE Trojan delivered in these attacks is packed with SmartAssembly and further obfuscated with ConfuserEx v1.0.0. The Trojan extracts and loads this embedded assembly by concatenating the contents of two resources named S1 and S2 and decompresses the resulting data using the GZipSteam class. The resulting Interop.SHDocVw .NET assembly is packed with SmartAssembly and further obfuscated using Confuser v1.9.0.0. By using the InternetExplorer application object, all C2 related requests will look as if they came from the legitimate browser and therefore will not contain any anomalous fields within the request, such as custom User-Agents. As seen in the above request, the Trojan will generate a URL for its beacon with the following structure: http://<c2 domain>/chk. The C2 server will respond to the Trojan’s request by echoing the value <hex(Environment.UserName/Environment.MachineName)> if it wishes to provide additional commands. If the C2 server does not respond with the appropriate echoed data, the Trojan will create a file named srvCheckresponded.tmp in the SpecialFolder.CommonApplicationData folder and write nothing to it before exiting | ['T1059.005'] |
The name of the local computer that corresponds to the IP address and the name of the port is shown unless the -n parameter is specified. If the port is not yet established, the port number is shown as an asterisk (*). Foreign Address The IP address and port number of the remote computer to which the socket is connected. If the port is not yet established, the port number is shown as an asterisk (*). (state) Indicates the state of a TCP connection. The possible states are as follows: CLOSE_WAIT CLOSED ESTABLISHED FIN_WAIT_1 FIN_WAIT_2 LAST_ACK LISTEN SYN_RECEIVED SYN_SEND TIMED_WAIT For more information about the states of a TCP connection, see RFC 793. Proto The name of the protocol (TCP or UDP). - Local Address The IP address of the local computer and the port number being used. The name of the local computer that corresponds to the IP address and the name of the port is shown unless the -n parameter is specified. If the port is not yet established, the port number is shown as an asterisk (*). - Foreign Address The IP address and port number of the remote computer to which the socket is connected. If the port is not yet established, the port number is shown as an asterisk (*). - - This command is available only if the Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) protocol is installed as a component in the properties of a network adapter in Network Connections | ['T1049'] |
The most common ports used are, 80, 1985, 1986, and 443. 1985 is the default port for the malware, 1986 is the lazy variation of that port. Port 80 and 443 are the default ports for HTTP and HTTPS traffic. The next most common is port 53. This is used in some of the newer 3.22 and 3.39 samples. After that, the count for each port starts declining sharply | ['T1571'] |
In previous iterations, the Astaroth Trojan campaign used cerutil to download files. In this iteration, they have replaced certutil with BITSAdmin | ['T1105'] |
Then, it encrypts it with 3DES before sending it (figure 28). The _P.Y ("0295A. 1618C") method in figure 26 creates the MD5 hash of the string. This hash is used as secret for the 3DES encryption | ['T1560'] |
This blog details the markers of this campaign, including macro content, campaign flow and phishing themes of our identified variants and older variants that have been attributed to Lazarus by other vendors. The Qualys Research Team recently identified a new Lazarus campaign using employment phishing lures targeting the defence sector. This is thematically similar to other observed variants where Lazarus has posed as defence companies like Northrop Grumman and BAE Systems with job openings. LockHeed Recruitment Lure . The macro uses aliases to rename the APIs that it uses (fig. 5). Other variants have used the UuidFromStringA function to decode the embedded payload and write it to an executable Heap. Lazarus has also used other novel methods to execute shellcode such as by using the function EnumSystemLocalesA as a callback to shellcode written to executable heap. 8). shellObj is the Wscript.Shell object that the vbs file uses to execute the beacon command. Additional vendors have also identified a variant that uses pcalua.exe. Additional vendors have reported on the current campaign while attributing it to Lazarus. Lazarus continues to evolve its capabilities by utilizing lesser-known shellcode execution techniques and incorporating various lolbins as part of its campaign | ['T1059.003'] |
Afterwards, the persistence file will be created in /Library/LaunchDaemons/ or ~/Library/LaunchAgents/ folder. This persistence file is also set to hidden with a randomly generated file date and time | ['T1543.004', 'T1543.001'] |
Extract the encoded payload. Decrypt the extracted payload. This uses the AES algorithm in CBC mode. Decompress the decrypted payload. This uses the LZMA algorithm. Decrypt the decompressed payload. This is simple XOR with byte key and as such does not impact compression ratio. Execute the decrypted payload as shellcode | ['T1027', 'T1140'] |
This function will either bind the calling process to a port or has the calling process connect to a remote host. The function is called in the following manner | ['T1134.002'] |
The attachment itself is an Microsoft Excel XLS document that contains malicious macro script. The document presents itself as a standard macro document but has all of its text hidden until the victim enables macros. Notably, all of the content text is accessible to the victim even before macros are enabled. However, a white font color is applied to the text to make it appear that the victim must enable macros to access the content. Once the macro is enabled, the content is presented via the following code: ActiveSheet.Range("a1:c54").Font.Color = vbBlack The code above changes the font color to black within the specified cell range and presents the content to the user. On initial inspection, the content appears to be the expected legitimate content, however, closer examination of the document shows several abnormal artifacts that would not exist in a legitimate document. Figure 2 below shows how the delivery document initially looks and the transformation the content undergoes as the macro runs | ['T1204.002'] |
This sample was delivered by a malicious document named “Interview with a north Korean defector”. The macro embedded inside unpacks and executes winload.exe | ['T1204.002'] |