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Warning: Android Bitcoin wallet apps vulnerable to theft | https://thehackernews.com/2013/08/hacking-bitcoin-android-vulnerability-digital-wallets.html | A critical vulnerability in the Android implementation of the Java SecureRandom random number generator was discovered, that leaves Bitcoin digital wallets on the mobile platform vulnerable to theft.
Before the announcement was made, users on the forums had noticed over 55 BTC were stolen a few hours after the client improperly signed a transaction using the compromised random number generator.
Bitcoin is a virtual currency that makes use of cryptography to create and transfer bitcoins. Users make use of digital wallets to store bitcoin addresses from which bitcoins are received or sent.
Bitcoin uses public-key cryptography so that each address is associated with a pair of mathematically linked public and private keys that are held in the wallet.
Because the problem is rooted in the operating system, every Bitcoin digital wallet generated by an Android app is affected by the weakness, including Bitcoin Wallet, blockchain.info wallet, Bitcoin Spinner, and Mycelium Wallet.
The developers have recommended that users generate a new address with a repaired random number generator and then send all the money in the wallet back to themselves. If you use an Android wallet then we strongly recommend you to upgrade to the latest version available in the Play Store as soon as one becomes available.
The virtual currency that can be transferred worldwide using peer-to-peer software is forcing bids to regulate it, including in the U.S. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network of the U.S Department of the Treasury.
| Vulnerability |
Book Review: Hacking Point of Sale, In-Depth Study on Payment Applications | https://thehackernews.com/2014/05/book-review-hacking-point-of-sale-in.html | Point-of-sale (POS) is the hottest topic in payment structures and its one of the most popular technology topics as well. A Point-of-sale (POS) machine is a computerized replacement for a cash register. It has ability to quickly process a customer's transaction, accurately keep the records, process credit and debit cards, connect to other systems in a network, and manage inventory.
A basic POS system would consist of a computer as its core part provided with application specific programs for the particular environment in which it will serve, along with a cash drawer, barcode scanner, receipt printer and the appropriate POS software. Point-of-sale (POS) terminals are used in most industries that have a point of sale such as a service desk, including restaurants, lodging, entertainment, and museums.
Due to the better track inventory and accuracy of records, the Point-of-sale (POS) machine is used worldwide and it can be easily set-up, depending on the nature of the business. But on the other hand, Point-of-sale (POS) systems are critical components in any retail environment and the users are not aware of the emerging threats it poses in near future.
Last week I read an excellent book entitled 'HACKING POINT OF SALE', written by Slava Gomzine, that summarizes, systemizes, and shares knowledge about payment application security.
In the Book, the author covers all the aspects of card payment processing from the security point of view that mainly depends on confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
In past few months, we have seen many massive data breaches targeting POS machines and the largest one is TARGET data breach occurred during the last Christmas holidays. The third-largest U.S. Retailer in which over 40 million Credit & Debit cards were stolen, used to pay for purchases at its 1500 stores nationwide in the U.S.
Not Target alone, multiple retailers including Neiman Marcus, Michaels Store were also targeted involving the heist of possibly 110 million Credit-Debit cards, and personal information.
Later, Target and other retailers confirmed that a malware was embedded in point-of-sale (POS) equipment at its checkout counters to collect secure data as the credit cards were swiped during transactions. That means the main theft resides in the company's POS system.
The Book 'Hacking Point of Sale: Payment Application Secrets, Threats, and Solutions' is all about the In-Depth technical information of attacks and vulnerabilities in Point-of-sale (POS) system, along with the extensive knowledge about the mitigation and protection measures.
THE BOOK WALKS THE READER THROUGH -
Technological overview of Electronic payment systems
POS applications architecture
Communication protocols
Attacks on Point-of-sale Systems
Step-by-step explanation of credit card fraud processes
POS payment application vulnerabilities and non-software attacks
Weak Encryption mechanisms and Poor key management
How to prevent attacks on payment applications using Cryptography
How to Protect the cardholders' sensitive information
How to protect the application itself by utilizing client and server certificates, digital signatures, and code obfuscation.
From a security perspective, the most critical risk lies in the payment process, because if the information that the customers hand over is captured somehow, the cyber criminals can use it to commit credit card frauds.
Also, many point-of-sale (POS) terminals are built using embedded versions of Microsoft Windows, which means that it is trivial for an attacker to create and develop malware that would run on a POS terminal.
Attackers can also steal the information by leveraging the weakness in the point-of-sale (POS) environment such as unprotected memory, unencrypted network transmission, poorly encrypted disk storage, card reader interface, or compromised pinpad device.
There are more than a billion active credit and debit card users in US alone, thus an active target for money motivated hackers. If we look at the figures, in 2011, POS terminals and payment card information was involved in almost 48% of security breaches which is more than any other data type breach.
Due to lack of concern and security measures, point-of-sale (POS) systems have become an attractive target for cybercriminals and to overcome the upcoming threats we should know its architecture, the areas of attacks and the defense measures.
Either you are a Developer, Security Architect , QA Analyst, Security Researcher or a Hacker, this book is really for you to grab the in-depth research of the point-of-sale (POS) systems, how it works, how it could be exploited, and what protection measures should be taken.
The Publisher 'Wiley' is offering a special 50% Discount on 'Hacking Point of Sale' book only for 'The Hacker News' readers, so get your copy today. Stay Tuned!
| Vulnerability |
New Fileless Malware Uses DNS Queries To Receive PowerShell Commands | https://thehackernews.com/2017/03/powershell-dns-malware.html | It is no secret that cybercriminals are becoming dramatically more adept, innovative, and stealthy with each passing day.
While new forms of cybercrime are on the rise, traditional activities seem to be shifting towards more clandestine techniques that involve the exploitation of standard system tools and protocols, which are not always monitored.
The latest example of such attack is DNSMessenger – a new Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that uses DNS queries to conduct malicious PowerShell commands on compromised computers – a technique that makes the RAT difficult to detect onto targeted systems.
The Trojan came to the attention of Cisco's Talos threat research group by a security researcher named Simpo, who highlighted a tweet that encoded text in a PowerShell script that said 'SourceFireSux.' SourceFire is one of Cisco's corporate security products.
DNSMessenger Attack Is Completely Fileless
Further analysis of the malware ultimately led Talos researchers to discover a sophisticated attack comprising a malicious Word document and a PowerShell backdoor communicating with its command-and-control servers via DNS requests.
Distributed through an email phishing campaign, the DNSMessenger attack is completely Fileless, as it does not involve writing files to the targeted system; instead, it uses DNS TXT messaging capabilities to fetch malicious PowerShell commands stored remotely as DNS TXT records.
This feature makes it invisible to standard anti-malware defenses.
PowerShell is a powerful scripting language built into Windows that allows for the automation of system administration tasks.
The malicious Word document has been crafted "to appear as if it were associated with a secure e-mail service that is secured by McAfee," according to a blog post published by Talos researchers Edmund Brumaghin and Colin Grady on Thursday.
Here's How the DNSMessenger attack Works:
When opened, the document launches a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macro to execute a self-contained PowerShell script in an attempt to run the backdoor onto the target system.
What's interesting? Everything, until this point, is done in memory, without writing any malicious files to the system's disk.
Next, the VBA script unpacks a compressed and sophisticated second stage of PowerShell, which involves checking for several parameters of the target environment, like the privileges of the logged-in user and the version of PowerShell installed on the target system.
This information is then used to ensure persistence on the infected host by changing the Windows Registry and installing a third stage PowerShell script that contains a simple backdoor.
The backdoor is being added to the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) database, if the victim does have administrative access, allowing the malware backdoor to stay persistent on the system even after a reboot.
The backdoor is an additional script that establishes a sophisticated 2-way communications channel over the Domain Name System (DNS) – usually used to look up the IP addresses associated with domain names, but has support for different types of records.
The DNSMessenger malware backdoor uses DNS TXT records that, by definition, allows a DNS server to attach unformatted text to a response.
The backdoor periodically sends DNS queries to one of a series of domains hard-coded in its source code. As part of those requests, it retrieves the domain's DNS TXT record, which contains further PowerShell commands that are executed but never written to the local system.
Now, this "fourth stage" Powershell script is the actual remote control tool used by the malware attacker.
This script queries the command-and-control servers via DNS TXT message requests to ask what commands to execute. Any command received is then executed, and the output is communicated back to the C&C server, allowing the attacker to execute any Windows or application commands on the infected system.
All attackers need to do is leave malicious commands and instructions inside the TXT records of their domains, which, when queried, is executed via the Windows Command Line Processor, and the output is sent back as another DNS query.
The domains registered by the DNSMessenger RAT are all down, so till now, it is not known that what types of commands the attackers relayed to infected systems. However, the researchers say this particular RAT was used in a small number of targeted attacks.
"This malware sample is an excellent example of the length attackers are willing to go to stay undetected while operating within the environments that they are targeting," the Talos researchers said.
"It also illustrates the importance that in addition to inspecting and filtering network protocols such as HTTP/HTTPS, SMTP/POP3, etc. DNS traffic within corporate networks should also be considered a channel that an attacker can use to implement a fully functional, bidirectional C2 infrastructure."
This is not the first time when the researchers came across a Fileless malware. At early last month, Kaspersky researchers also discovered fileless malware, that resides solely in the memory of the compromised computers, targeting banks, telecommunication companies, and government organizations in 40 countries.
| Malware |
Remote Execution Flaw Threatens Apps Built Using Spring Framework — Patch Now | https://thehackernews.com/2018/04/spring-framework-hacking.html | Security researchers have discovered three vulnerabilities in the Spring Development Framework, one of which is a critical remote code execution flaw that could allow remote attackers to execute arbitrary code against applications built with it.
Spring Framework is a popular, lightweight and an open source framework for developing Java-based enterprise applications.
In an advisory released today by Pivotal, the company detailed following three vulnerabilities discovered in Spring Framework versions 5.0 to 5.0.4, 4.3 to 4.3.14, and older unsupported versions:
Critical: Remote Code Execution with spring-messaging (CVE-2018-1270)
High: Directory Traversal with Spring MVC on Windows (CVE-2018-1271)
Low: Multipart Content Pollution with Spring Framework (CVE-2018-1272)
Vulnerable Spring Framework versions expose STOMP clients over WebSocket endpoints with an in-memory STOMP broker through the 'spring-messaging' module, which could allow an attacker to send a maliciously crafted message to the broker, leading to a remote code execution attack (CVE-2018-1270).
"The use of authentication and authorization of messages, such as the one provided by Spring Security, can limit exposure to this vulnerability only to users who are allowed to use the application," the company suggests.
The second bug (CVE-2018-1271) resides in Spring's Web model-view-controller (MVC) that allows attackers to execute directory traversal attack and access restricted directories when configured to serve static resources (e.g., CSS, JS, images) from a file system on Windows.
This vulnerability doesn't work if you are not using Windows to serve content and can be avoided if you don't serve files from the file system or use Tomcat/WildFly as the server.
Pivotal has released Spring Framework 5.0.5 and 4.3.15, which include fixes for all the three vulnerabilities. The company has also released Spring Boot 2.0.1 and 1.5.11, that match the patched Spring Framework versions.
So developers and administrators are highly recommended to upgrade their software to the latest versions immediately.
| Vulnerability |
Unpatched Python and Java Flaws Let Hackers Bypass Firewall Using FTP Injection | https://thehackernews.com/2017/02/python-java-ftp-protocol-injection.html | This newly discovered bugs in Java and Python is a big deal today.
The two popular programming languages, Java and Python, contain similar security flaws that can be exploited to send unauthorized emails and bypass any firewall defenses.
And since both the flaws remain unpatched, hackers can take advantage to design potential cyber attack operations against critical networks and infrastructures.
The unpatched flaws actually reside in the way Java and Python programming languages handle File Transfer Protocol (FTP) links, where they don't syntax-check the username parameter, which leads to, what researchers call, protocol injection flaw.
Java/Python FTP Injection to Send Unauthorized SMTP Emails
In a blog post published over the past week, security researcher Alexander Klink detailed the FTP protocol injection vulnerability in Java's XML eXternal Entity (XXE) that allows attackers to inject non-FTP malicious commands inside an FTP connection request.
To demonstrate the attack, Alexander showed how to send an unauthorized email via SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) in an FTP connection attempt, even though the FTP connection failed, as FTP servers does support authentication, but doesn't check for the present of carriage returns (CR) or line feeds (LF) in usernames.
"This attack is particularly interesting in a scenario where you can reach an (unrestricted, maybe not even spam- or malware-filtering) internal mail server from the machine doing the XML parsing," Alexander concluded.
Java/Python FTP Injections Allow to Bypass Firewall
However, two days later in a separate security advisory, security researcher Timothy Morgan from Blindspot Security came forward with his findings, showing more threatening exploitation scenario where the FTP URL handlers in both Java and Python can be used to bypass firewalls.
Morgan said such FTP protocol injection flaw could be used to trick a victim's firewall into accepting TCP connections from the web to the vulnerable host's system on its "high" ports (from 1024 to 65535).
Besides the FTP protocol injection attack, there's reside a decade old security issue in FTP protocol called classic mode FTP – an insecure mechanism of client-server FTP interactions, but many firewall vendors still support it by default.
When a classic mode FTP connection is initiated, the firewall temporarily opens a port – typically between 1024 and 65535 – specified in the PORT command, which introduces security risks.
Using the FTP protocol injection issue in Java and Python, an attacker who knows the targeted host's internal IP address can start a classic mode FTP connection, which attackers can use for nefarious purposes.
Morgan has determined that an attacker can open up one port in the targeted firewall with only three requests:
Identify the victim's internal IP address – this requires an attacker to "send an URL, see how the client behaves, then try another until the attack is successful."
Determine packet alignment and ensure that the PORT command is injected at the right moment, making the attack work.
Exploit the vulnerability.
Each additional request can be used to open up another TCP port.
Easily Exploitable Protocol Injection Flaw
However, the researcher warned that his exploit could be used for man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks, server-side request forgery (SSRF), an XEE attack and more – and once bypassed the firewall, desktop hosts can be attacked even if they do not have Java installed.
All an attacker need is to convince victims into accessing a malicious Java or Python applications installed on a server to bypass the entire firewall.
"If a desktop user could be convinced to visit a malicious website while Java is installed, even if Java applets are disabled, they could still trigger Java Web Start to parse a JNLP (Java Network Launch Protocol) file," Morgan said. "These files could contain malicious FTP URLs which trigger this bug."
"Also note, that since Java parses JNLP files before presenting the user with any security warnings, the attack can be entirely successful without any indication to the user (unless the browser itself warns the user about Java Web Start being launched)."
According to Morgan, a nearly identical flaw also exists in Python's urllib2 and urllib libraries, although "this injection appears to be limited to attacks via directory names specified in the URL."
Protocol Injection Flaw Is Still Unpatched
Morgan said the FTP protocol injection flaw was reported to the Python team in January 2016 and Oracle in November 2016 by his company, but neither of the two has issued any update to address the issue.
Morgan has developed a proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit but is currently holding back publication of his exploit until Oracle and Python respond to the disclosure and release patches.
The Morgan's exploit has successfully been tested against Palo Alto Networks and Cisco ASA firewalls, though researchers believe many commercial firewalls are also vulnerable to FTP stream injection attacks.
So until patches become available, Morgan suggests users uninstall Java on their desktops and in browsers, as well as disable support for "classic mode" FTP on all firewalls.
| Cyber_Attack |
Iframe Injection & Blind SQL Injection vulnerability on Apple.com exposed by Idahc(lebanese hacker) | https://thehackernews.com/2011/07/iframe-injection-blind-sql-injection.html | Iframe Injection & Blind SQL Injection vulnerability on Apple.com exposed by Idahc(lebanese hacker)
After Sony hacks, Idahc(lebanese hacker) is back to strike Apple.com . He found two vulnerability on https://consultants.apple.com/ as listed below.
Iframe Injection : Click here
Blind SQL INjection: Click Here
Examples of the injections:
Example One
Example two
Two days before Another sub-domain of Apple's database was hacked with SQL injection by Anonymous : Read Here
Hacker Expose the Database ,extracted using Blind Sql injection on a pastebin link.
According to Hacker "I am Idahc(lebanese hacker) I found a Blind SQLI and Iframe Injection on AppleI am not one of Anonymous or Lulzsecand I am against The ANTISEC OPERATIONBUt this is a poc with not confidential informationI didn't dump users,emails,passwords........".
| Vulnerability |
WildPressure APT Emerges With New Malware Targeting Windows and macOS | https://thehackernews.com/2021/07/wildpressure-apt-emerges-with-new.html | A malicious campaign that has set its sights on industrial-related entities in the Middle East since 2019 has resurfaced with an upgraded malware toolset to strike both Windows and macOS operating systems, symbolizing an expansion in both its targets and its strategy around distributing threats.
Russian cybersecurity firm attributed the attacks to an advanced persistent threat (APT) it tracks as "WildPressure," with victims believed to be in the oil and gas industry.
WildPressure first came to light in March 2020 based off of a malware operation distributing a fully-featured C++ Trojan dubbed "Milum" that enabled the threat actor to gain remote control of the compromised device. The attacks were said to have begun as early as August 2019.
"For their campaign infrastructure, the operators used rented OVH and Netzbetrieb virtual private servers (VPS) and a domain registered with the Domains by Proxy anonymization service," Kaspersky researcher Denis Legezo noted last year.
Since then, new malware samples used in WildPressure campaigns have been unearthed, including a newer version of the C++ Milum Trojan, a corresponding VBScript variant with the same version number, and a Python script named "Guard" that works across both Windows and macOS.
The Python-based multi-OS Trojan, which extensively makes of publicly available third-party code, is engineered to beacon the victim machine's hostname, machine architecture, and OS release name to a remote server and check for installed anti-malware products, following which it awaits commands from the server that allow it to download and upload arbitrary files, execute commands, update the Trojan, and erase its traces from the infected host.
The VBScript version of the malware, named "Tandis," features similar capabilities to that of Guard and Milum, while leveraging encrypted XML over HTTP for command-and-control (C2) communications. Separately, Kaspersky said it found a number of previously unknown C++ plugins that have been used to gather data on infected systems, such as recording keystrokes and capturing screenshots.
What's more, in what appears to be an evolution of the modus operandi, the latest campaign — besides relying on commercial VPS — also weaved compromised legitimate WordPress websites into their attack infrastructure, with the websites serving as Guard relay servers.
To date, there's neither clear visibility regarding the malware spreading mechanism nor any strong code- or victim-based similarities with other known threat actors. However, the researchers said they spotted minor ties in the techniques used by another adversary called BlackShadow, which also operates in the same region.
The "tactics aren't unique enough to come to any attribution conclusion – it's possible both groups are simply using the same generic techniques and programming approaches," Legezo said.
| Cyber_Attack |
New Android malware forwards incoming messages to hacker | https://thehackernews.com/2013/05/android-malware-that-sends-incoming.html | A new type of Android malware that can intercept text messages and forwarding to hackers is discovered by the Russian firm Doctor Web. This is a very serious threat to users, because using this malware attackers can easily get two factor authentication code of your Email or bank accounts.
The malware, dubbed as Android.Pincer.2.origin, is the second form of the original Android.Pincer malware and is distributed as security certificates that the user must install.
Upon launching Android.Pincer.2.origin, the user will see a fake notification about the certificate's successful installation but after that, the Trojan will not perform any noticeable activities for a while.
Android.Pincer.2.origin connects to a server and send text messages in addition to the other information as the smartphone model, serial, IMEI and phone number and the Android version is used.
To malware then receive instructions from commands in the following format:
start_sms_forwarding [telephone number] - begin intercepting communications from a specified number
stop_sms_forwarding - stop intercepting messages
send_sms [phone number and text] - send a short message using the specified parameters
simple_execute_ussd - send a USSD message
stop_program - stop working
show_message - display a message on the screen of the mobile device
set_urls - change the address of the control server
ping - send an SMS containing the text 'pong' to a previously specified number
set_sms_number - change the number to which messages containing the text string 'pong' are sent.
The command start_sms_forwarding is of particular interest since it allows attackers to indicate the number from which the Trojan needs to intercept messages. This feature enables criminals to use the Trojan for targeted attacks and steal specific messages.
| Malware |
Chinese Hackers Target Air-Gapped Networks in Southeast Asia | https://thehackernews.com/2015/04/a-state-sponsored-cyber-espionage-group.html | A State-sponsored Cyber Espionage Group -- most likely linked to the Chinese government becomes the first group to target the so-called "Air-Gapped Networks" that aren't directly connected to the Internet.
What are Air-Gapped systems?
Air-gapped systems are known to be the most safest and secure systems on the earth. These systems are isolated from the Internet or any other Internet-connected computers or external networks.
Air-gapped systems are generally used in the critical situations that demand high security like in payment networks to process debit and credit card transactions, military networks, and in industrial control systems that operate critical infrastructure of the Nation.
Why Air-Gapped?
It is very difficult to siphon data from Air-Gapped systems because it requires a physical access to the target system or machine in order to do that and gaining physical access is possible only by using removable devices such as a firewire cable or a USB flash drive.
Now:
Since 2005, a Chinese Hacking Group has been spying dedicatedly on Governments, Companies & Journalists in Southeast Asia, India, & other countries, according to FireEye.
In a 69-page technical report, FireEye said the Chinese cyber espionage operations went undetected for the last ten years, conducted by a team of highly skilled hackers, dubbed APT30 (Advanced Persistent Threat).
Now here's the deal:
The APT30 Group is particularly interested in stealing information related to:
Regional Political
Disputed Territories
Military and Economic issues
Media Organizations and journalists
Political Developments in Southeast Asia and India
"APT30's attempts to compromise journalists and media outlets could also be used to punish outlets that do not provide favorable coverage – for example, both the New York Times and Bloomberg have had trouble securing visas for journalists in wake of unfavorable corruption reporting,", the report said.
This isn't enough:
The group has reportedly developed a number of secret hacking tools and backdoors [MILKMAID, ORANGEADE Droppers, CREAMSICLE Downloader, BACKBEND, GEMCUTTER Downloaders] over the period of last ten years and infected victims using Phishing and Social Engineering attacks.
However, the Capability to infiltrating air gapped systems makes the APT30 hacking group more sophisticated in nature.
In order to hack into an air-gapped computer, the group tricked their victims into downloading malware on their home computers.
"APT30 uses three pieces of malware [SHIPSHAPE, SPACESHIP, FLASHFLOOD] that are believed to have been designed to propagate to removable drives with the intent of eventually infecting and stealing data from computers located on air-gapped networks."
The Malware, designed with worm-like capabilities, can infect removable drives such as USB sticks and hard drives. Those devices can transfer the malware if later plugged into the secure networks.
TARGETED COUNTRIES
The countries primarily targeted were:
India
Malaysia
Vietnam
Thailand
South Korea
Nepal
Bhutan
Philippines
Singapore
Saudi Arabia
Indonesia
Japan
Brunei
Myanmar
Laos
Cambodia
The Government of China has consistently denied these claims, arguing "cybercrime is a global problem."
| Malware |
U.S. Recovers $2.3 Million Ransom Paid to Colonial Pipeline Hackers | https://thehackernews.com/2021/06/us-recovers-23-million-ransom-paid-to.html | In a major blow, the U.S. Department of Justice on Monday said it has recovered 63.7 bitcoins (currently valued at $2.3 million) paid by Colonial Pipeline to the DarkSide ransomware extortionists on May 8, pursuant to a seizure warrant that was authorized by the Northern District of California.
The ransomware attack also hobbled the pipeline company's fuel supply, prompting the government to issue an emergency declaration, even as the company shelled out a ransom amount of approximately 75 bitcoins ($4.4 million as of May 8) to regain access to its systems.
A week after the highly publicized incident, the ransomware-as-a-service syndicate disbanded with a May 14 farewell message to affiliates, stating that its internet servers and cryptocurrency stash were seized by unknown law enforcement entities. While DarkSide's announcement was perceived as an exit scam, the latest move from DoJ confirms earlier speculations of law enforcement involvement.
Stating that "ransom payments are the fuel that propels the digital extortion engine," the DoJ said it followed the money trails left by the DarkSide gang to a specific bitcoin address by reviewing the Bitcoin public ledger, to which the proceeds of the ransom payment were transferred, ultimately using the "private key" the FBI had in its possession to access crypto assets stored in the wallet in question.
"There is no place beyond the reach of the FBI to conceal illicit funds that will prevent us from imposing risk and consequences upon malicious cyber actors," said FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate. "We will continue to use all of our available resources and leverage our domestic and international partnerships to disrupt ransomware attacks and protect our private sector partners and the American public."
It's not immediately clear how the intelligence agency came to have the private key, but DarkSide had previously claimed to have lost access to one of their payment servers.
Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic, which had identified the bitcoin transaction representing the Colonial Pipeline ransom payment, said the seized bitcoins represent 85% of the total ransom amount which is typically reserved for affiliates, with the rest going to the DarkSide developers. The Bitcoin address was emptied at around 1:40 p.m. ET on Monday, Dr. Tom Robinson, Elliptic's co-founder and chief scientist, said.
If anything, the seizure marks a first-of-its-kind orchestrated effort led by the DoJ's newly formed Ransomware and Digital Extortion Task Force to confiscate a cybercriminal cartel's illicit profits by breaking into its bitcoin wallet using its private key likely stored in the seized servers, as implied in the warrant.
"Holding cyber criminals accountable and disrupting the ecosystem that allows them to operate is the best way to deter and defend against future attacks of this nature," Colonial Pipeline CEO Joseph Blount said in the statement. "The private sector also has an equally important role to play and we must continue to take cyber threats seriously and invest accordingly to harden our defenses."
| Cyber_Attack |
Warning: Beware of Post-Election Phishing Emails Targeting NGOs and Think Tanks | https://thehackernews.com/2016/11/election-trump-phishing-malware.html | Just a few hours after Donald Trump won the 2016 US Presidential Election, a hacking group launched a wave of cyber attacks targeting U.S.-based policy think-tanks with a new spear phishing campaign designed to fool victims into installing malware.
The group of nation-state hackers, also known as Cozy Bear, APT29, and CozyDuke, is the one of those involved in the recent data breach of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and is allegedly tied to the Russian government.
On Wednesday, the hackers sent a series of phishing emails to dozens of targets associated with non-governmental organizations (NGOs), policy think tanks in the US and even inside the US government, said security firm Volexity.
Phishing Attacks Powered by 'PowerDuke' Malware
The phishing emails were sent from purpose-built Gmail accounts and other compromised email accounts at Harvard University's Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), trying to trick victims into opening tainted attachments containing malware and clicking on malicious links.
Once this was done, the phishing e-mail dropped a new variant of Backdoor malware, dubbed "PowerDuke," giving attackers remote access to the compromised systems.
PowerDuke is an extremely sophisticated piece of malware in both its way of infecting people as well as concealing its presence.
Besides making use of wide variety of approaches, PowerDuke uses steganography to hide its backdoor code in PNG files.
The firm spotted and reported at least five waves of phishing attacks targeting people who work for organizations, including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the RAND Corporation, the Atlantic Council, and the State Department, among others.
"Three of the five attack waves contained links to download files from domains that the attackers appear to have control over," the firm said in a blog post. "The other two attacks contained documents with malicious macros embedded within them. Each of these different attack waves was slightly different from one another."
Beware of Post-Election Themed Phishing Emails
All the phishing emails were election-themed. Why?
After Trump won the US presidential election, half of America, as well as people across the world, mourning the result was curious to know about the victory of Trump.
People even started searching on Google: How did Donald Trump win the US presidential election?, Were the election flawed? Why did Hillary Clinton lose?
Hackers took advantage of this curiosity to target victims, especially those who worked with the United States government and were much more concerned about Trump's victory.
Two of the emails claimed to have come from the Clinton Foundation giving insight of the elections, two others purported to be documents pertaining to the election's outcome being revised or rigged, and the last one offered a link to a PDF download on 'Why American Elections Are Flawed.'
The emails were sent using the real email address of a professor at Harvard, which indicates that the hackers likely hacked the professor's email and then used his account to send out the phishing emails.
The emails either contained malicious links to .ZIP files or included malicious Windows shortcut files linked to a "clean" Rich Text Format document and a PowerShell script.
Once clicked, the script installed PowerDuke on a victim's computer that could allow attackers to examine and control the target system. The malware has the capability to secretly download additional malicious files and evade detection from antivirus products.
Security firm CrowdStrike claimed in June 2016 that the hacking team Cozy Bear has previously hacked into networks belonging to the White House, State Department, and the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff.
| Cyber_Attack |
Legacy Native Malware in Angry Birds Space to pwn your Android ! | https://thehackernews.com/2012/04/legacy-native-malware-in-angry-birds.html | Legacy Native Malware in Angry Birds Space to pwn your Android
A new malware threatens phones and tablets running Google's OS by hiding inside a copy of the popular game. Researchers at the mobile security firm Lookout identified the reworked malware as Legacy Native (LeNa), which poses as a legitimate app to gain unauthorized privileges on Android phones.
Under the appearance of a legitimate application, LeNa tricked users into allowing it access to information. "By employing an exploit, this new variant of LeNa does not depend on user interaction to gain root access to a device. This extends its impact to users of devices not patched against this vulnerability (versions prior to 2.3.4 that do not otherwise have a back-ported patch)," Lookout said in a blog post.
In March, another Trojan appeared pretending to be legitimate Chinese game, The Roar of the Pharaoh. The malicious app appeared on the Google Play store, stealing users' data and money by sending SMS messages to premium-rate numbers without the owner's knowledge.
One binary exploits the GingerBreak vulnerability to drop and launch the second, an updated version of LeNa. This payload communicates with a remote Command and Control server and accepts instructions to install additional packages and push URLs to be displayed in the browser.
The malware connects to remote servers in order to send sensitive phone information and to install malicious software on the infected handset. The new LeNa seems like a fully functional copy of popular apps, like "Angry Birds Space," and, according to Lookout, "hides its malicious payload in the string of code at the end of an otherwise genuine JPEG file."
Well ! Before you download any app, check the permissions it requests, if you're uncomfortable with the amount of access to your phone an app wants, don't download it. For now, Android users who are only downloading apps from Google Play (Android Market) are safe. The new version of LeNa has been spotted on third-party Chinese app websites.
| Malware |
Flame spy virus going to Suicide | https://thehackernews.com/2012/06/flame-spy-virus-going-to-suicide.html | Flame spy virus going to Suicide
The creators of the world's most complicated espionage virus Flame have sent a 'suicide' command that removes it from some infected computers. U.S. computer security researchers said on Sunday that the Flame computer virus, which struck at least 600 specific computer systems in Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority, has gotten orders to vanish, leaving no trace.
The 20-megabyte piece of malware already had a self-destruct module known as SUICIDE that removed all files and folders associated with Flame, but the purging command observed by Symantec researchers instead relied on a file called browse23.ocx that did much the same thing. According to Symantec, the 'suicide' command was "designed to completely remove Flame from the compromised computer," the BBC reports.
Computers infected with Flame, including honeypots, have been routinely contacting its C&C servers to check for new commands. When the C&C servers still owned by Flame's authors recently sent out a self-destruct code, Symantec detected the command immediately.
Flame was designed to suck information from computer networks and relay what it learned back to those controlling the virus. It can record keystrokes, capture screen images, and eavesdrop using microphones built into computers.
Bots have long contained such self-destruct mechanisms, so it's not surprising that malware as complex and comprehensive as Flame would, too.
| Malware |
Experian South Africa Suffers Data Breach Affecting Millions; Attacker Identified | https://thehackernews.com/2020/08/experian-data-breach-attack.html | The South African arm of one of the world's largest credit check companies Experian yesterday announced a data breach incident that exposed personal information of millions of its customers.
While Experian itself didn't mention the number of affect customers, in a report, the South African Banking Risk Information Centre—an anti-fraud and banking non-profit organization who worked with Experian to investigate the breach—disclosed that the attacker had reportedly stolen data of 24 million South Africans and 793,749 business entities.
Notably, according to the company, the suspected attacker behind this breach had already been identified, and the stolen data of its customers had successfully been deleted from his/her computing devices.
"We have identified the suspect and confirm that Experian South Africa was successful in obtaining and executing an Anton Piller order which resulted in the individual's hardware being impounded and the misappropriated data being secured and deleted."
Experian South Africa has already reported the breach to law enforcement and the appropriate regulatory authorities.
The company claims there is no evidence indicating whether the stolen data includes consumers' credit or financial information or used for fraudulent purposes before authorities had it deleted.
"Our investigations also show that the suspect had intended to use the data to create marketing leads to offer insurance and credit-related services."
"The compromise of personal information can create opportunities for criminals to impersonate you but does not guarantee access to your banking profile or accounts. However, criminals can use this information to trick you into disclosing your confidential banking details," says SABRIC CEO, Nischal Mewalall.
Besides releasing this information, SAFPS also recommended that credit reporting agency customers should immediately apply for a free Protective Registration listing with Southern Africa Fraud Prevention Service that has been designed to alert users when their identity is compromised.
You can also regularly check your credit report for free here.
| Data_Breaches |
Hackers Exploit VPN to Deploy SUPERNOVA malware on SolarWinds Orion | https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/hackers-exploit-vpn-flaw-to-deploy.html | The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has disclosed details of a new advanced persistent threat (APT) that's leveraging the Supernova backdoor to compromise SolarWinds Orion installations after gaining access to the network through a connection to a Pulse Secure VPN device.
"The threat actor connected to the entity's network via a Pulse Secure virtual private network (VPN) appliance, moved laterally to its SolarWinds Orion server, installed malware referred to by security researchers as SUPERNOVA (a .NET web shell), and collected credentials," the agency said on Thursday.
CISA said it identified the threat actor during an incident response engagement at an unnamed organization and found that the attacker had access to the enterprise's network for nearly a year through the use of the VPN credentials between March 2020 and February 2021.
Interestingly, the adversary is said to have used valid accounts that had multi-factor authentication (MFA) enabled, rather than an exploit for a vulnerability, to connect to the VPN, thus allowing them to masquerade as legitimate teleworking employees of the affected entity.
In December 2020, Microsoft disclosed that a second espionage group may have been abusing the IT infrastructure provider's Orion software to drop a persistent backdoor called Supernova on target systems. The intrusions have since been attributed to a China-linked threat actor called Spiral.
Unlike Sunburst and other pieces of malware that have been connected to the SolarWinds compromise, Supernova is a .NET web shell implemented by modifying an "app_web_logoimagehandler.ashx.b6031896.dll" module of the SolarWinds Orion application. The modifications were made possible by leveraging an authentication bypass vulnerability in the Orion API tracked as CVE-2020-10148, in turn permitting a remote attacker to execute unauthenticated API commands.
An investigation into the incident is ongoing. In the meantime, CISA is recommending organizations to implement MFA for privileged accounts, enable firewalls to filter unsolicited connection requests, enforce strong password policies, and secure Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) and other remote access solutions.
| Malware |
ZeuS Botnet Updating Infected Systems with Rootkit-Equipped Trojan | https://thehackernews.com/2014/04/zeus-banking-trojan-botnet-rootkit-malware.html | ZeuS, or Zbot is one of the oldest families of financial malware, it is a Trojan horse capable to carry out various malicious and criminal tasks and is often used to steal banking information. It is distributed to a wide audience, primarily through infected web pages, spam campaigns and drive-by downloads.
Earlier this month, Comodo AV labs identified a dangerous variant of ZeuS Banking Trojan which is signed by stolen Digital Certificate belonging to Microsoft Developer to avoid detection from Web browsers and anti-virus systems.
FREE! FREE! ZeuS BRINGS ROOTKIT UPDATE
Recently, the security researcher, Kan Chen at Fortinet has found that P2P Zeus botnet is updating its bots/infected systems with updates version that has the capability to drop a rootkit into infected systems and hides the trojan to prevent the removal of malicious files and registry entries.
The new variant also double check for the earlier installed version (0x38) of ZeuS trojan on the infected system and then replaces it with updated binary files (0X3B version).
"Every P2P Zeus binary would extract the version number from the update packet and compare the version number that is hardcoded in its body" to verify the success of update process.
According to researchers, there is only a minimal change in the new variant of P2P Zeus as the new binary also drops a rootkit driver file into the %SYSTEM32%\drivers folder, apart from its original functions. New Zeus Trojan equipped with rootkit feature makes it more sophisticated and increases the difficulty of removing Zeus from infected systems.
HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM ZeuS TROJAN
We recommend users to use common sense and think twice before giving a click to any link on their e-mails or at any other websites they visit.
Trustworthy companies don't send attachments unless you have requested specific documents. So, always use caution if you receive any email from an unknown contact with attachments that you haven't requested and do not bother to open it.
Install a best Internet Security Tool and Configure the firewall to maximize the security of your computer system.
| Malware |
DarkBot Malware Circulation very fast via Skype | https://thehackernews.com/2012/10/darkbot-malware-circulation-very-fast.html | Two weeks back we reported that Security firm Trend Micro discovered a worm targeting Skype users with spam messages designed to infect machines with the Dorkbot ransomware has been discovered. This malware is spreading through a question/ phrase sent to the users by someone and the question is: "lol is this your new profile pic?"
Yesterday Security researchers from Avast have intercepted a currently spreading Darkbot malware campaign, that's affecting millions of Skype users. According to him," It targets all the major Web browsers, and is also capable of distributing related malware such as Ransomware/LockScreen, as well as steal accounting data for major social networking services such as Facebook, Twitter, as well as related services such as GoDaddy, PayPal and Netflix."
Some of the infected PCs install the malware known as ransomeware which locks your PC and ask you to pay $200 dollars within 48 hours to retrieve your files.
"If you click on the link, your infected computer becomes part of a botnet, or a network of computers controlled by hackers to execute DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks. A DDoS attack causes the site or service to be temporarily unavailable by flooding the targeted website with traffic until the site's servers are overloaded."
Initially only 2 of the present 44 antivirus engines identified the threat, but currently the number has increased to 27, which is still quite low. However, it also indicates that about 1 Million users must have clicked o the links and greeted infection on the links.
Users are advised to ensure that they're running the latest version of their third-party software, browser plugins, ensure that the URL they're about to click on hasn't already been flagged as malicious, and take advantage of application sandboxing techniques to avoid direct exploitation of their host.
| Malware |
The Hacker News Hacking Awards : Best of Year 2011 | https://thehackernews.com/2012/01/hacker-news-hacking-awards-best-of-year.html | The Hacker News Hacking Awards : Best of Year 2011
2011 has been labeled the "Year of the Hack" or "Epic #Fail 2011". Hacking has become much easier over the years, which is why 2011 had a lot of hacking for good and for bad. Hackers are coming up with tools as well as finding new methods for hacking faster then companies can increase their security. Every year there are always forward advancements in the tools and programs that can be used by the hackers.
At the end of year 2011 we decided to give "The Hacker News Awards 2011". The Hacker News Awards will be an annual awards ceremony celebrating the achievements and failures of security researchers and the Hacking community. The THN Award is judged by a panel of respected security researchers and Editors at The Hacker News.
Year 2011 came to an end following Operation Payback and Antisec, which targeted companies refusing to accept payments to WikiLeak's, such as, Visa and Amazon. Those attacks were carried out by Anonymous & Lulzsec. This year corporations, international agencies, and governments are now experiencing a flood of what is called Advanced Persistent Threats. APTs refer to a group of well-funded, highly capable hackers pursuing a specific agenda, often organized by a nation or State. Sony somehow pissed off the hacking group LulzSec, which downloaded information for millions of users, while posting to Sony's system: "LulzSec was here you sexy bastards! Stupid Sony, so very stupid."
The Hacker News Awards Categories & Winners
1.) Person of the Year : Julian Paul Assange
He is, of course, the lean, tall, and pale 39-year-old Australian master hacker at the white-hot center of the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks and, after revealing thousands of secret Afghan battlefield reports this week, the subject of investigation by U.S. authorities. 2011 could also be called the "Age of WikiLeaks". Assange described himself in a private conversation as "the heart and soul of this organisation, its founder, philosopher, spokesperson, original coder, organizer, financier, and all the rest". Wikileaks celebrate its 5th Birthday on 4th October 2011, for being only 5 years old they have done a remarkable and outstanding job of serving the people. The one thing most governments in the world have left off their agenda's. Keep up the good work Wikileaks and we stand in support and behind you.
2.) Best Hacking Group of the Year 2011 : ANONYMOUS
DECK THE HALLS AND BATTON DOWN THE SECURITY SYSTEMS…..THEY AIN'T GOIN AWAY!
Anonymous hackers have gained world wide attention because of their hacktivism. Anonymous is not an organization. Anonymous has no leaders, no gurus, no ideologists. Anonymous has performed many operations like Attack on HBGary Federal, 2011 Bank of America document release, Operation Sony, Operation Anti-Security and lots more. Complete Coverage on all Anonymous related news is here.
3.) Best Whitehat hacker of the Year 2011 : CHARLIE MILLER
CHARLIE SHOWS TUNA ISN'T THE ONLY THING TO PROFIT FROM!
Charlie Miller is a former hacker who has become an information security consultant now working with the Department of Defense (DOD) and helping out with cyber security. He spent five years working for the National Security Agency. Miller demonstrated his hacks publicly on products manufactured by Apple. In 2008 he won a $10,000 cash prize at the hacker conference Pwn2Own in Vancouver Canada for being the first to find a critical bug in the ultrathin MacBook Air. The next year, he won $5,000 for cracking Safari. In 2009 he also demonstrated an SMS processing vulnerability that allowed for complete compromise of the Apple iPhone and denial-of-service attacks on other phones. In 2011 he found a security hole in an iPhone's or iPad's security. Charlie Miller gets a kick of out defeating Apple's security mechanisms, using his hacking skills to break into Macbooks and iPhones.
4.) Best Leak of the year 2011 : HBGARY FEDERAL EMAILS LEAKED BY ANONYMOUS
GEE GREG, YOU THOUGHT WE JUST PLAYED WITH MATEL COMPUTERS! NOT!!!!!
HBGary Federal who was helping the federal government track down cyber activists was itself hacked by the very same activists! Gotta love these guys. Through an elegant but by the numbers social engineering effort those fun fellas at Anonymous, hacked and publicly shamed poor little HBGary Federal. Massive reputation damage and tons of turn-over in executive leadership resulted. Anonymous released 27,000 emails from the server of Greg Hoglund, chief executive of the software security firm HBGary. They posted 50,000 emails of Aaron Barr from the CEO of its sister organization, HBGary Federal. They obtained the emails by hacking into Hoglund's email.
5.) Best Defacement of the Year 2011 : DNS HIJACKING OF HIGH PROFILE SITES BY TURKGUVENLIGI
TURKGUVENLIGI……..THE GIFT THAT KEEPS ON GIVING!!
Turkguvenligi also known by the name "TG Hacker' hacked some very high profile sites using DNS Hijacking. Sites included, Theregister.co.uk , Vodafone, Telegraph, Acer, National Geographic. He diverted visitors to a page declaring it was "World Hackers Day". TurkGuvenligi has claimed credit for dozens of similar defacement attacks since late 2008.
6.) Craziest Hack of the year: INMOTION HOSTING (Over 700,000 Websites Hacked)
BEWARE OF TIGER'S IN MOTION…….COMING TO YOUR WEBSITE SOON!
InMotion's data center got hit by the hacker that calls himself TiGER-M@TE, leaving a few hundred thousand website owners with nonfunctional pages and 700,000 web Pages defaced . He is also the one responsible for the attack carried out on Google Bangladesh. In our humble opinion, this is the craziest hack of the year.
7.) Malware of Year 2011 : DuQu
ALAH CAN'T HELP IRAN…….NOT WITH DuQu ON THE LOOSE!
This year was really hot on malware discovery and analysis. DuQu became the first known network modular rootkit. DuQu has flexibility for hackers to help remove and add new features quickly and without special effort. Some experts have doubts on relation between the Stuxnet and DuQu creators as they both aim for stealing and collecting data related to Iranian agencies activities.
8.) Best Hacking Tool of the Year 2011 - ANTI (Android Network Toolkit)
HEY CYBER WORLD, STICK THIS IN YOUR TOOL BELT!
ANTI is the smallest but most powerful hacking tool developed by the company Zimperium. Anti-Android Network Toolkit is an app that uses WiFi scanning tools to scan networks. You can scan a network that you have the phone connected to or you can scan any other nearby open networks. Security admins can use Anti to test network host vulnerabilities for DoS attacks and other threats. Features : OS detection, traceroute, port connect, Wi-Fi monitor, HTTP server, man-in-the-middle threats, remote exploits, Password Cracker and DoS attack and plugins.
9.) High Profile Hacker of the Year 2011 : LULZSEC
LULZSEC KEEPS US LAUGHING ALL THROUGH 2011!
Lulz Security, commonly abbreviated as LulzSec, is a computer hacker group that claims responsibility for several high profile attacks, including the compromise of user accounts from Sony Pictures in 2011. The group also claimed responsibility for taking the CIA website offline. It has gained attention due to its high profile targets and the sarcastic messages it has posted in the aftermath of its attacks. The group's first recorded attack was against Fox.com's website. LulzSec does not appear to hack for financial profit. The group's claimed main motivation is to have fun by causing mayhem. They do things "for the lulz" and focus on the possible comedic and entertainment value of attacking targets.
10.) Biggest Victim of the Year 2011 : SONY
SONY SHINES AS THE BIGGEST VICTIM OF ALL!
Sony gets the Most Epic fail award so we want to give the Best Victim of the year award to Sony. Almost all Sony's websites including Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Greece, Canada, Netherlands, Europe, Russia, Portugal & Sony PlayStation Network were Hacked. Defacement of various domains of Sony and Personal information of 77 million people, including customer names, addresses, e-mail addresses, birthdays, PlayStation Network and Qriocity passwords, user names, online handles and possibly credit cards were exposed. Sony expects the hack of the PlayStation Network and cost at ¥14 billion (US$170 million) .
11.) Most Spamy Social Network : FACEBOOK
FACEBOOK OUTTA FACE IT……..IT'S A RIPE TARGET FOR 2012
Social network sites such as Facebook, Google+ or Twitter are gaining popularity. But the 'Web 2.0' presents new dangers. The wave of pornographic and violent images, Spam messages, Virus and various Worms that flooded Facebook over the past year, make it the Most Spamy Social Network of the Year. Social media is the new frontier for all of this spam. The attack tricked users into clicking on a story they thought would bring them a related video or picture. Instead, Facebook members were taken to websites that attacked their browsers with malicious software and posted violent and disturbing images to their news feeds.
12.) Most Vulnerable Mobile OS of Year 2011 : ANDROIDS
MALWARE GETS A FREE RIDE ON MOBILE DEVICES!
Mobile devices are seeing a record number of Malware attacks, with Androids leading the way as the mobile operating systems are the most likely to be targeted. Android's vulnerability to malicious content including third-party apps, SMS Trojan viruses and unexpected bugs distributed through free Wi-Fi connections has risen by 45% in 2011. This year we have seen record-breaking numbers of Malware, especially on mobile devices, where the uptake is in direct correlation to popularity.
13.) Best Hacking Book of the Year: BACKTRACK 5 WIRELESS PENETRATION TESTING
ATTENTION CLASS, VIVEK RAMACHANDRAN HAS ENTERED THE ROOM!
Vivek Ramachandran is a world renowned security researcher and evangelist, who is well known for his discovery of the Wireless Caffe Latte attack, and author of the most amazing book "BackTrack 5 Wireless Penetration Testing. This book is written completely from a practical perspective. The book wastes no time in delving into a hands-on session with wireless networking. All the way through there are lots of screengrabs, so you can see what should be happening on your screen.
14.) Most Innovative Hack : DIGITAL CERTIFICATES SPOOFING BY COMODO HACKER
COMODOHACKER BRINGS OUT THE DRAGON IN CYBER SECURITY CONCERNS
The name "Comodohacker" gets the most Innovative Hacker award from THN for the breach of the Internet's trust system arising from an outmoded method for assuring that a Web site is authentic. A breach that let a hacker spoof digital certificates for Google.com, Yahoo.com, and other Web sites is prompting browser makers to rethink security. A 21-year-old Iranian patriot took credit saying he was protesting US policy and retaliating against the US for its alleged involvement with last year's Stuxnet, which experts say was designed to target Iran's nuclear program.
15.) Biggest hack of the Year 2011 : SONY PLAYSTATION
SONY, SONY, WE PLAY YOUR LEAKS ON OUR OWN STATIONS!
The PlayStation Network is an online multiplayer gaming and digital media delivery service owned and run by Sony Computer Entertainment .On April 26, 2011 Sony Playstation announced its network and Qriocity had both been compromised by hackers between April 17 and April 19 allowing access to 70 million user accounts. Get full coverage on this News.
"TRUTH IS THE MOST POWERFUL WEAPON AGAINST INJUSTICE"
For additional information, please contact us at: [email protected]
| Vulnerability |
Microsoft remotely deleted Tor-based 'Sefnit Botnet' from more than 2 Million Systems | https://thehackernews.com/2014/01/microsoft-remotely-deleted-tor-browser.html | In October 2013, Microsoft adopted a silent, offensive method to tackle infection due to a Tor-based botnet malware called 'Sefnit'.
In an effort to takedown of the Sefnit botnet to protect windows users, Microsoft remotely removes the older versions of installed Tor Browser software and infection from 2 Million systems, even without the knowledge of the system's owner.
Last year in August, after Snowden revelations about the National Security Agency's (NSA) Spying programs, the Internet users were under fear of being spied. During the same time Tor Project leaders noticed almost 600% increase in the number of users over the anonymizing networks of Tor i.e. More than 600,000 users join Tor within few weeks.
In September, researchers identified the major reason of increased Tor users i.e. A Tor-based botnet called 'Sefnit malware', which was infecting millions of computers for click fraud and bitcoin mining.
To achieve the maximum number of infections, cyber criminals were using several ways to spread their botnet. On later investigation, Microsoft discovered some popular softwares like Browser Protector and FileScout, bundled with vulnerable version of Tor Browser & Sefnit components.
'The security problem lies in the fact that during a Sefnit component infection, the Tor client service is also silently installed in the background. Even after Sefnit is removed, unless specific care is taken, the Tor service will be left and still regularly connect to the Tor Network.'
It was not practically possible for Microsoft or the Government to instruct each individual on 'How to remove this Malware', so finally Microsoft took the decision of remotely washing out the infections themselves.
To clean infected machines, Microsoft began updating definitions for its antimalware apps.
"We modified our signatures to remove the Sefnit-added Tor client service. Signature and remediation are included in all Microsoft security software, including Microsoft Security Essentials, Windows Defender on Windows 8, Microsoft Safety Scanner, Microsoft System Center Endpoint Protection, and Windows Defender Offline." and later also in Malicious Software Removal Tool.
But why Tor Browser?
"Even after Sefnit is removed, unless specific care is taken, the Tor service will be left and still regularly connect to the Tor Network. This is a problem not only for the workload it applies to the Tor Network, but also for the security of these computers." Microsoft says.
So they removed it and to Justify their action, Microsoft points out several vulnerabilities in the Tor version bundled with Sefnit malware i.e. Tor version 0.2.3.25, that opens the user to attack through these known vulnerabilities.
"Tor is a good application used to anonymous traffic and usually poses no threat. Unfortunately, the version installed by Sefnit is v0.2.3.25 – and does not self-update. The latest Tor release builds at the time of writing is v0.2.4.20."
May be this is the right way to neutralize the infections, but the Microsoft's action also clarifies the capability to remotely remove any software from your computer.
Nicholas J. Hopper from University of Minnesota, provided a detailed explanation about 'Protecting Tor from botnet abuse in the long term' in a paper.
| Vulnerability |
Hacking Virtual Reality – Researchers Exploit Popular Bigscreen VR App | https://thehackernews.com/2019/02/bigscreen-vr-hacking.html | A team of cybersecurity researchers from the University of New Haven yesterday released a video demonstrating how vulnerabilities that most programmers often underestimate could have allowed hackers to evade privacy and security of your virtual reality experience as well as the real world.
According to the researchers—Ibrahim Baggili, Peter Casey and Martin Vondráček—the underlying vulnerabilities, technical details of which are not yet publicly available but shared exclusively with The Hacker News, resided in a popular virtual reality (VR) application called Bigscreen and the Unity game development platform, on which Bigscreen is built.
Bigscreen is a popular VR application that describes itself as a "virtual living room," enabling friends to hang out together in virtual world, watch movies in a virtual cinema, chat in the lobby, make private rooms, collaborate on projects together, share their computer screens or control in a virtual environment and more.
Scary Things Hackers Can Do to Your VR Experience
As shown in the video, the flaws in Bigscreen app literally allowed researchers to remotely hijack Bigscreen's web infrastructure (that runs behind its desktop application) and perform multiple attack scenarios through a custom-designed command-and-control server, including:
discover private rooms,
join any VR room, including private rooms,
eavesdrop on users while remaining invisible in any VR room,
view VR users' computer screens in real-time,
stealthily receive victim's screen sharing, audio, and microphone audio,
send messages on the user's behalf,
remove/ban users from a room
setup a self-replicating worm that could spread across the Bigscreen community,
and many more.
What's even more Worrisome? Besides this, a different vulnerability in the Unity Engine Scripting API that researchers exploited in combination with the Bigscreen flaw, allowed them to even take complete control over VR users' computers by secretly downloading and installing malware or running malicious commands without requiring any further interaction.
Bigscreen VR App and Unity Engine Vulnerabilities
According to the in-depth technical details shared with The Hacker News, multiple Bigscreen flaws in question are persistent/stored cross-site scripting (XSS) issues that reside in the input fields where VR users are supposed to submit their username, room name, room description, room category in the Bigscreen app.
Since the vulnerable input boxes were not sanitized, attackers could have leveraged the flaw to inject and execute malicious JavaScript code on the application installed by other users connecting to the Bigscreen lobby and VR rooms.
"The payload script will be executed upon the browser-based player entering a room affecting all members of the room. This attack vector allows for the modification/invocation of any variable/function within the scope of the Window," researchers told The Hacker News.
"In summary, the ability to execute JavaScript on the victim's machine allows for many other attacks such as phishing pop-ups, forged messages, and forced desktop sharing."
"We observed a lack of authentication when handling private room joining and communications with the Bigscreen signaling server. As a result, several potential vulnerabilities arise, to include denial of service, manipulation of public rooms, brute force attacks, and server resource exhaustion."
As demonstrated by the team, attackers can also inject malicious JavaScript payloads to leverage an undocumented and potentially dangerous Unity Scripting API to secretly download malware from the Internet and execute it on a targeted system or for all users.
"The function Unity.openLink() was found to launch web links in the default 6 browsers. An XSS attack containing an HTTP, FTP, or SMB link could cause arbitrary files to be fetched and downloaded," researchers told The Hacker News.
"We expect that most of the applications using affected Unity API may be vulnerable."
The team discovered the vulnerabilities while testing the security of VR systems through its National Science Foundation-funded project.
Man-in-the-Room (MITR) Attack
As dubbed by the researchers, Man-in-the-Room is one of the attack scenarios where a hacker secretly joins a VR room while remaining invisible to other users in the same room.
"They can't see you, they can't hear you, but the hacker can hear and see them, like an invisible Peeping Tom. A different layer of privacy has been invaded," Ibrahim Baggili, founder and co-director of the Cyber Forensics Research and Education Group, said.
The team found that Bigscreen application uses Dynamically Loaded Libraries (DLLs) without integrity checking that allowed the researchers to modify the source code of selected libraries and change its behavior, letting them hide their presence from UI using XSS payloads.
"Our proof-of-concept WebRTC application was able to connect to legitimate Bigscreen application. This lead to complete control over one end of audio/video/microphone/data streams. Our application was invisible in the VR room because it did not send any data to other peers," the researchers said.
The team responsibly reported their findings to both Bigscreen and Unity. Bigscreen acknowledged the security vulnerabilities in its "servers and streaming systems" and released the new Bigscreen Beta "2019 Update" that fully patched the issues.
Moreover, Unity acknowledged the vulnerabilities by merely adding a note to its documentation stating that its platform "can be used to open more than just web pages, so it has important security implication you must be aware of."
| Vulnerability |
Passwordstate Password Manager Update Hijacked to Install Backdoor on Thousands of PCs | https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/passwordstate-password-manager-update.html | Click Studios, the Australian software company behind the Passwordstate password management application, has notified customers to reset their passwords following a supply chain attack.
The Adelaide-based firm said a bad actor used sophisticated techniques to compromise the software's update mechanism and used it to drop malware on user computers.
The breach is said to have occurred between April 20, 8:33 PM UTC, and April 22, 0:30 AM UTC, for a total period of about 28 hours.
"Only customers that performed In-Place Upgrades between the times stated above are believed to be affected," the company said in an advisory. "Manual Upgrades of Passwordstate are not compromised. Affected customers password records may have been harvested."
The development was first reported by the Polish tech news site Niebezpiecznik. It's not immediately clear who the attackers are or how they compromised the password manager's update feature. Click Studios said an investigation into the incident is ongoing but noted "the number of affected customers appears to be very low."
Passwordstate is an on-premise web-based solution used for enterprise password management, enabling businesses to securely store passwords, integrate the solution into their applications, and reset passwords across a range of systems, among others. The software is used by 29,000 customers and 370,000 security and IT professionals globally, counting several Fortune 500 companies spanning verticals such as banking, insurance, defense, government, education, and manufacturing.
According to an initial analysis shared by Denmark-based security firm CSIS Group, the malware-laced update came in the form of a ZIP archive file, "Passwordstate_upgrade.zip," which contained a modified version of a library called "moserware.secretsplitter.dll" (VirusTotal submissions here and here).
This file, in turn, established contact with a remote server to fetch a second-stage payload ("upgrade_service_upgrade.zip") that extracted Passwordstate data and exported the information back to the adversary's CDN network. Click Studios said the server was taken down as of April 22 at 7:00 AM UTC.
The full list of compromised information includes computer name, user name, domain name, current process name, current process id, names and IDs of all running processes, names of all running services, display name and status, Passwordstate instance's Proxy Server Address, usernames and passwords..
Click Studios has released a hotfix package to help customers remove the attacker's tampered DLL and overwrite it with a legitimate variant. The company is also recommending that businesses reset all credentials associated with external facing systems (firewalls, VPN) as well as internal infrastructure (storage systems, local systems) and any other passwords stored in Passwordstate.
Passwordstate's breach comes as supply chain attacks are fast emerging a new threat to companies that depend on third-party software vendors for their day-to-day operations. In December 2020, a rogue update to the SolarWinds Orion network management software installed a backdoor on the networks of up to 18,000 customers.
Last week, software auditing startup Codecov alerted customers that it discovered its software had been infected with a backdoor as early as January 31 to gain access to authentication tokens for various internal software accounts used by developers. The incident didn't come to light until April 1.
| Cyber_Attack |
All Smartwatches are vulnerable to Hackers | https://thehackernews.com/2015/07/smartwatch-hacking.html | Do you own a Smartwatch? If yes, then how safe it is? There are almost 100 percent chances that you own a vulnerable Smartwatch.
Computer manufacturer Hewlett-Packard is warning users of smartwatches including Apple Watch and Samsung Gear that their wearable devices are vulnerable to cyber attacks.
In a study, HP's Fortify tested today's top 10 smartwatches for security features, such as basic data encryption, password protection and privacy concerns.
The most shocking part of the study was that –
Not even a Single Smartwatch Found to be 100 percent Safe
Security experts found that 100 percent of wearable devices contained at least one serious security vulnerability that could make the devices vulnerable to hackers.
With the increase in the adoption of smartwatches, manufacturers need to pay closer attention to the customers' security because these wearable devices could potentially open doors to new threats to personal and sensitive information.
"As the adoption of Smartwatches accelerates, the platform will become vastly more attractive to those who would abuse that access, making it critical that we take precautions when transmitting personal data or connecting Smartwatches into corporate networks," Jason Schmitt, general manager at HP's Security Fortify said in a statement.
The study [PDF], no doubt, had included Smart watches by Apple, Pebble, Samsung and Sony, as it claims to have picked top 10 smartwatches.
Here's the list of issues reported by HP:
1. Lack of transport encryption – Though all products implemented transport encryption using SSL/TLS, 40 percent of devices found to be either vulnerable to the POODLE attack, allowing the use of weak cyphers, or still using SSL v2.
2. Insecure Interfaces – Three out of ten smartwatches used cloud-based web interfaces and all of them were vulnerable to account harvesting. This allowed unlimited login attempts, helping hackers guess passwords.
3. Insufficient User Authentication/Authorization – Three out of ten smartwatches completely failed to offer Two-Factor authentication, or the ability to lock accounts after 3 to 5 failed password attempts.
4. Insecure Software/Firmware – 7 out of 10 smartwatches had issues with firmware updates. The wearable devices, including smartwatches, often did not receive encrypted firmware updates, but many updates were signed to help prevent malicious firmware updates from being installed. While a lack of encryption did not allow the files to be downloaded and analyzed.
5. Privacy Concerns – Smartwatches also demonstrate a risk to personal security as well as privacy. All the tested devices collected some form of personal information, including username, address, date of birth, gender, heart rate, weight and other health information.
The experts said it would not disclose the names of smartphone manufacturers whose watches they had tested, but they are working with vendors to "build security into their products before they put them out to market."
Meanwhile, HP urges users to not connect their smartwatches to the sensitive access control functions like cars or homes unless strong authorization is offered.
| Vulnerability |
Facebook Status Update With XFBML Injection | https://thehackernews.com/2011/08/facebook-status-update-with-xfbml.html | Facebook Status Update With XFBML Injection
i Last week Acizninja DeadcOde share Tweaking Facebook Status with HTML button. Well today he is going to share another kind of cool tricks to tweak Facebook Status Update using XFBML Injection. With this tweak, we will do an injection on Facebook URL and then share the results of the injections on our Facebook status .Here's the preview and the url code :
LIVE STREAM : https://www.facebook.com/unix.root/posts/217926581593127
[code]
https://www.facebook.com/connect/prompt_feed.php?display=touch&api_key=209403259107231&link=https://t.co/q3EzkPR&attachment={%27description%27%3A%27%3Cfb:live-stream%20event_app_id=%22266225821384%22%20width=%22400%22%20height=%22500%22%20xid=%22%22%20via_url=%22https://t.co/q3EzkPR%22%20always_post_to_friends=%22false%22%3E%3C/fb:live-stream%3E+%27}
[/code]
TEXT AREA : https://www.facebook.com/unix.root/posts/136123736478234
[code]
https://www.facebook.com/connect/prompt_feed.php?&api_key=209403259107231&attachment={%27name%27:%27%20%3Ccenter%3E%3Cfb:editor-text%20label=%22Powered%20By%22%20name=%22title%22%20value=%22%20https://thehackernews.com%22/%3E%3C/br%3E%3Ccenter%3E%3C/center%3E%3Cfb:editor-textarea%20label=%22Komentar%20Anda%22%20name=%22comment%22%20value=%22%20JEMPOL%22/%3E%3Cfb:editor-buttonset%3E%3Ccenter%3E%3Cbutton+type%3D%22button%22%3EKomentari%3C/button%3E%3C/center%3E%27}
[/code]
CAPTCHA : https://www.facebook.com/unix.root/posts/248809308482674
[code]
https://www.facebook.com/connect/prompt_feed.php?&attachment={'href'%3A'http%3A%2F%2Fthehackernews.com'%2C'name'%3A'+<center><button+type%3D"button">Fail + book = Facebook<%2Fbutton><%2Fcenter><fb%3Acaptcha+showalways%3D"true"+%2F><input+type%3D"submit"+%2F><%2Fform><button+type%3D"button">kirim+<%2Fbutton>%27}
[/code]
Happy Tweaking,
[Source] and Credit to : Acizninja DeadcOde
| Vulnerability |
Interpol Arrests 3 Nigerian BEC Scammers For Targeting Over 500,000 Entities | https://thehackernews.com/2020/11/interpol-arrest-3-nigerian-bec-scammers.html | Three Nigerian citizens suspected of being members of an organized cybercrime group behind distributing malware, carrying out phishing campaigns, and extensive Business Email Compromise (BEC) scams have been arrested in the city of Lagos, Interpol reported yesterday.
The investigation, dubbed "Operation Falcon," was jointly undertaken by the international police organization along with Singapore-based cybersecurity firm Group-IB and the Nigeria Police Force, the principal law enforcement agency in the country.
About 50,000 targeted victims of the criminal schemes have been identified so far, as the probe continues to track down other suspected gang members and the monetization methods employed by the group.
Group-IB's participation in the year-long operation came as part of Interpol's Project Gateway, which provides a framework for agreements with selected private sector partners and receives threat intel directly.
"The suspects are alleged to have developed phishing links, domains, and mass mailing campaigns in which they impersonated representatives of organizations," Interpol said. "They then used these campaigns to disseminate 26 malware programmes, spyware and remote access tools, including AgentTesla, Loki, Azorult, Spartan and the nanocore and Remcos Remote Access Trojans."
In addition to perpetrating BEC campaigns and sending out emails containing malware-laced email attachments, the attacks have been used to infiltrate and monitor the systems of victim organizations and individuals, leading to the compromise of at least 500,000 government and private sector companies in more than 150 countries since 2017.
According to Group-IB, the three individuals — identified only by their initials OC, IO, and OI — are believed to be members of a gang which it has been tracking under the moniker TMT, a prolific cybercrime crew that it says is divided into multiple smaller subgroups based on an analysis of the attackers' infrastructure and techniques.
Some of their mass email phishing campaigns took the form of purchasing orders, product inquiries, and even COVID-19 aid impersonating legitimate companies, with the operators leveraging Gammadyne Mailer and Turbo-Mailer to send out phishing emails. The group also relied on MailChimp to track whether a recipient opened the message.
The ultimate goal of the attacks, Group-IB noted, was to steal authentication data from browsers, email, and FTP clients from companies located in the US, the UK, Singapore, Japan, Nigeria, among others.
"This group was running a well-established criminal business model," Interpol's Cybercrime Director Craig Jones noted. "From infiltration to cashing in, they used a multitude of tools and techniques to generate maximum profits."
| Malware |
Value.net (ISP) hacked by Sec Indi | https://thehackernews.com/2011/05/valuenet-isp-hacked-by-sec-indi.html | Value.net (ISP) hacked by Sec Indi
According to Sec Indi "value.net ISP has security holes, actually the holes are unknown., no damages or changes done in server"
Hack Proof:
| Vulnerability |
Free Thanatos Ransomware Decryption Tool Released | https://thehackernews.com/2018/06/free-ransomware-decryption-tools.html | If your computer has been infected with Thanatos Ransomware and you are searching for a free ransomware decryption tool to unlock or decrypt your files—your search is over here.
Security researchers at Cisco Talos have discovered a weakness in the Thanatos ransomware code that makes it possible for victims to unlock their Thanatos encrypted files for free without paying any ransom in cryptocurrencies.
Like all ransomware threats, Thanatos encrypts files and asks victims to pay for ransom in multiple cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin Cash, to decrypt their files.
"Multiple versions of Thanatos have been leveraged by attackers, indicating that this is an evolving threat that continues to be actively developed by threat actors with multiple versions having been distributed in the wild," the researchers say.
"Unlike other ransomware commonly being distributed, Thanatos does not demand ransom payments to be made using a single cryptocurrency like bitcoin. Instead, it has been observed supporting ransom payments in the form of Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Zcash (ZEC), Ethereum (ETH) and others."
Once infected, all the encrypted filename extensions on the affected computer are changed to .THANATOS, and then a ransom note pops up whenever the user tries to log on to the system, instructing them to send the ransom money to a hardcoded cryptocurrency wallet address in order to decrypt the files.
However, since Thanatos uses different encryption keys to encrypt each file on an infected system without storing them anywhere, it is impossible for malware authors to return users' data, even if the victims pay the ransom.
Free Thanatos Ransomware Decryption Tool
Cisco researchers analyzed the malware code and found a loophole in the design of the file encryption methodology used by Thanatos, using which they developed a free ransomware decryption tool that will help victims decrypt their files.
Dubbed ThanatosDecryptor, the open source, free ransomware decryption tool can be downloaded from the GitHub website, which has recently been acquired by Microsoft for $7.5 billion, and works for Thanatos ransomware versions 1 and 1.1
Since the encryption keys used by Thanatos are derived based upon the number of milliseconds since the system last booted, it was possible for researchers to reverse engineer the logic and re-generate the same 32-bit encryption key using brute force attack and Windows Event Logs.
"Since Thanatos does not modify the file creation dates on encrypted files, the key search space can be further reduced to approximately the number of milliseconds within the 24-hour period leading up to the infection," researchers explain.
"At an average of 100,000 brute-force attempts per second (which was the baseline in a virtual machine used for testing), it would take roughly 14 minutes to successfully recover the encryption key in these conditions."
For more detail about the Thanatos ransomware, you can head on to detailed blog post published by Cisco Talos today.
How to Protect Yourself From Ransomware Attacks
Most ransomware spread through phishing emails, malicious adverts on websites, and third-party apps and programs. Whether it's Locky, CoinVault, Thanatos, TeslaCrypt, or any other ransomware malware, the protection measures are standard.
To safeguard against such ransomware attacks, you should always be suspicious of uninvited documents sent in an email and never click on links inside those documents unless verifying their sources.
Check if macros are disabled in your MS Office apps. If not, block macros from running in MS Office files from the Internet.
In order to always have a tight grip on all your important documents, keep a good backup routine in place that makes copies of your files to an external storage device which is not always connected to your PC.
Moreover, make sure that you run an active behavioral-based antivirus security suite on your system that can detect and block such malware before it can infect your device, and always remember to keep them up-to-date.
| Malware |
Free Tool Allows Anyone to View Facebook Users' Hidden Friends List | https://thehackernews.com/2015/05/facebook-friends-mapper.html | Facebook lets you control your every single information posted on the social media site by giving many options to make them private from others, even from your friends.
But…
There are some personal information on Facebook that you just cannot completely hide — Your friends list are among those, even if there is an option to hide it.
The issue resides in the Facebook's mutual-friends feature concept, which has been in controversies in the past, raising privacy concerns.
But now, a new Free Chrome extension called "Facebook Friends Mapper" (developed by Alon Kollmann) can expose a lot more than just mutual friends of the two Facebook users in "just one click," creating high security and Privacy risks for Facebook users.
Generally, Facebook also allows you to set the visibility of your list of Facebook friends to "Only Me" if you want to keep your friends list hidden from other Facebook users as well as your own friends.
However, the problem is…
...even if you set your friends list to private, other Facebook users may still be able to see part of your hidden Friends list and that part is a lot more than just your mutual friends.
How does Facebook Friends Mapper Chrome extension work?
Facebook Friends Mapper extension leverages the Mutual Friends feature of the social networking site to crawl and expose your hidden Facebook Friends list.
If, for example, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg does not share his friends list with the public and neither I am on his friend list. However, I have at least one mutual friend with him. Therefore…
...using Facebook Friends Mapper tool I would be able to see most of his hidden Facebook friends by exploiting the 'mutual friend' logical flaw.
How to use Facebook Friends Mapper Chrome extension?
1. Install Facebook Friends Mapper extension from Chrome web store.
2. Open Facebook Profile of user you want to target.
3. You will find 'Reveal Friends' option on Friends tab.
4. Click on Reveal Friends and Bang!
Just one condition to meet:
In case you want to see hidden Facebook Friend list of anyone, you can use Facebook Friends Mapper extension if you fulfill the following conditions:
Facebook user, whose friends list you want to target, must have at least one mutual friend with you, and doesn't matter if you are friends with him/her or not.
Facebook Friends Mapper Chrome extension launched just a few days ago, so most of the users are yet unaware about this Facebook Hacking Tool.
You can Install Facebook Friends Mapper Chrome extension from free from Google Chrome Extension Store.
If you are willing to keep your friend list private, then please note that Facebook's current privacy setting would not help you to resolve the issue. So, we expect a privacy patch from Facebook Security team as soon as possible before this tool goes wild.
| Vulnerability |
Chinese Hackers group 'Comment Crew' is still active and operating under cover | https://thehackernews.com/2013/06/Comment-Crew-Chinese-Hackers.html | Security experts are confident that the Chinese hackers group known as Comment Crew is still operating under cover. "The Comment Crew is back again" this is the rumor within Intelligence community, researchers suspect the involvement of the group of hackers in the recent cyber dispute between U.S. and China.
Let's make a step back, last February Mandiant Intelligence firm released an interesting report that revealed an enterprise-scale computer espionage campaign dubbed APT1.
Mandiant linked the APT1 attacks, that compromised 141 organizations in seven years, to Chinese military unit called "61398". The is very interesting is that the security firm identified a common pattern for the attacks conducted by Chinese hackers group, it was also able to define a series of key indicators for identifying ongoing APT attacks.
Mandiant security firm had monitored the group during last years and report details its operations, it wasn't the only one FireEye is another company which is distinguished in this type of investigation.
From the analysis of past attacks and the observation of ongoing events the researchers noted that after the intense activities observed early 2013 the group Comment Crew stopped using its infrastructures and to attack the previous targets. The behavior was probably caused by a change of tactics of the group after the revelations of it operations, it's common conviction that The Comment Crew group started new campaigns against new targets using different infrastructures.
Senior researcher at FireEye. Alex Lanstein sustains that The Comment Crew is still working undercover after an apparent period of rest:
"They took a little breather, and they started back up," he said. "We didn't see them take control of any of the systems they had previously compromised," "They started fresh with a whole new round of attacks." Lanstein revealed.
The Comment Crew is a group of state-sponsored hackers that operates with a predefined scheme, the security analysts revealed that all the cyber attacks share tools and methods and in many cases from the analysis of the malicious code used it is possible to track the source of the offensives.
The researchers used to track malware campaigns analyzing tracks left by hackers including keyboard layouts and the presence of embedded fonts and abuse of bogus DNS (domain name system) registration details.
Lanstein highlighted another new detail revealed by the investigation of FireEye, The Comment Crew group left the name of their particular coding project, called "Moonclient," in many instances of the malware detected. FireEye kept this information secret to avoid allow its team to follow the Comment Crew but it seems now it seems they have changed tactics and malware.
Lanstein commented on the forgetfulness of hackers with the following words: "you are dealing with humans on the other side of the keyboard," "This is a mistake made over and over again," "It's more difficult to track them now," Lanstein said.
FireEye has released today an interesting report titled "Digital Bread Crumbs: Seven Clues To Identifying Who's Behind Advanced Cyber Attacks " that explains how to conduct an investigation based on common errors committed by the hackers.
The document is based on the analysis of nearly 1,500 campaigns tracked by FireEye, the paper reported the results of the study on the common characteristics of various attack and the way to identify the hackers:
Keyboard Layout. Hidden in phishing attempts is information about the attacker's choice of keyboard, which varies by language and region.
Malware Metadata. Malware source code contains technical details that suggest the attacker's language, location, and ties to other campaigns.
Embedded Fonts. The fonts used in phishing emails point to the origin of the attack. This is true even when the fonts are not normally used in the attacker's native language.
DNS Registration. Domains used in attacks pinpoint the attacker's location. Duplicate registration information can tie multiple domains to a common culprit.
Language. Language artifacts embedded in malware often point to the attacker's country of origin and common language mistakes in phishing emails can sometimes be reverse-engineered to determine the writer's native language.
Remote Administration Tool Configuration. Popular malware-creation tools include a bevy of configuration options. These options are often unique to the attacker using the tool, allowing researchers to tie disparate attacks to a common threat actor.
Behavior. Behavioral patterns such as methods and targets give away some of the attacker's methods and motives.
I found the report very interesting and I strongly suggest you its reading, to uncover cyber espionage campaign so articulated and complex it is fundamental to recognize the evidence of ongoing attacks and the real origin of the attackers.
A targeted organization could use the knowledge on methods and objective of the attack for:
Immediately shift resources to bolster vulnerable data
Enlist additional help, whether internal resources or law enforcement
More closely examine other vectors—possibly overlooked—that have been used by the attackers other campaigns
| Cyber_Attack |
U.S. drones affected by Keylogger Virus | https://thehackernews.com/2011/10/us-drones-affected-by-keylogger-virus.html | U.S. drones affected by Keylogger Virus
A keylogger of some sort has infiltrated classified and unclassified computer systems at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, recording the keystrokes of pilots tasked with operating unmanned drone aircraft in Afghanistan and other international conflict zones.
The virus, first detected nearly two weeks ago by the military's Host-Based Security System, has not prevented pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada from flying their missions overseas. Nor have there been any confirmed incidents of classified information being lost or sent to an outside source. But the virus has resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech's computers, network security specialists say. And the infection underscores the ongoing security risks in what has become the U.S. military's most important weapons system.
Tadd Sholtis, a spokesman for Air Combat Command, which oversees the drones and all other Air Force tactical aircraft said, "We generally do not discuss specific vulnerabilities, threats, or responses to our computer networks, since that helps people looking to exploit or attack our systems to refine their approach. We invest a lot in protecting and monitoring our systems to counter threats and ensure security, which includes a comprehensive response to viruses, worms, and other malware we discover."
| Malware |
Uber Paid 20-Year-Old Florida Hacker $100,000 to Keep Data Breach Secret | https://thehackernews.com/2017/12/uber-hacker.html | Last year, Uber received an email from an anonymous person demanding money in exchange for the stolen user database.
It turns out that a 20-year-old Florida man, with the help of another, breached Uber's system last year and was paid a huge amount by the company to destroy the data and keep the incident secret.
Just last week, Uber announced that a massive data breach in October 2016 exposed personal data of 57 million customers and drivers and that it paid two hackers $100,000 in ransom to destroy the information.
However, the ride-hailing company did not disclose identities or any information about the hackers or how it paid them.
Now, two unknown sources familiar with the incident have told Reuters that Uber paid a Florida man through HackerOne platform, a service that helps companies to host their bug bounty and vulnerability disclosure program.
So far, the identity of the Florida man was unable to be obtained or another person who helped him carry out the hack.
Notably, HackerOne, who does not manage or plays any role in deciding the rewards on behalf of companies, receives identifying information of the recipient (hackers and researchers) via an IRS W-9 or W-8BEN form before payment of the award can be made.
In other words, some employees at Uber and HackerOne definitely knows the real identity of the hacker, but choose not to pursue the case, as the individual did not appear to pose any future threat to the company.
Moreover, the sources also said that Uber conducted a forensic analysis of the hacker's computer to make sure that all the stolen data had been wiped, and had the hacker also sign a nondisclosure agreement to prevent further wrongdoings.
Reportedly, the Florida man also paid some unknown portion of the received bounty to the second person, who was responsible for helping him obtain credentials from GitHub for access to Uber data stored elsewhere.
Originally occurred in October 2016, the breach exposed the names and driver license numbers of some 600,000 drivers in the United States, and the names, emails, and mobile phone numbers of around 57 million Uber users worldwide, which included drivers as well.
However, other personal details, like trip location history, dates of birth, credit card numbers, bank account numbers, and Social Security numbers, were not accessed in the attack.
Former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick learned of the cyber attack in November 2016 and chose not to involve authorities, believing the company can easily and more effectively negotiate directly with the hackers to limit any harm to its customers.
However, this secret dealing with the hackers eventually cost Uber security executives their jobs for handling the incident.
Now Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has reportedly fired Uber Chief Security Officer Joe Sullivan, and one of his deputies, Craig Clark, who worked to keep the data breach quiet.
"None of this should have happened, and I will not make excuses for it. While I cannot erase the past, I can commit on behalf of every Uber employee that we will learn from our mistakes," Khosrowshahi said.
"We are changing the way we do business, putting integrity at the core of every decision we make and working hard to earn the trust of our customers."
Last week, three more top Uber security managers resigned, including Sullivan's chief of staff Pooja Ashok, senior security engineer Prithvi Rai, and physical security chief Jeff Jones.
| Cyber_Attack |
High-Severity Linux Sudo Flaw Allows Users to Gain Root Privileges | https://thehackernews.com/2017/05/linux-sudo-root-hack.html | A high-severity vulnerability has been reported in Linux that could be exploited by a low privilege attacker to gain full root access on an affected system.
The vulnerability, identified as CVE-2017-1000367, was discovered by researchers at Qualys Security in Sudo's "get_process_ttyname()" function for Linux that could allow a user with Sudo privileges to run commands as root or elevate privileges to root.
Sudo, stands for "superuser do!," is a program for Linux and UNIX operating systems that lets standard users run specific commands as a superuser (aka root user), such as adding users or performing system updates.
The flaw actually resides in the way Sudo parsed "tty" information from the process status file in the proc filesystem.
On Linux machines, sudo parses the /proc/[pid]/stat file in order to determine the device number of the process's tty from field 7 (tty_nr), Qualys Security explains in its advisory.
Although the fields in the file are space-delimited, it is possible for field 2 (the command name) to include whitespace (including newline), which sudo doesn't account for.
Therefore, a local user with sudo privileges (Sudoer) on SELinux-enabled systems can cause sudo to use a device number of his choice "by creating a symbolic link from the sudo binary to a name that contains a space, followed by a number," escalating their privileges to overwrite any file on the filesystem, including root-owned files.
"To exploit the bug, the user can choose a device number that does not currently exist under /dev. If sudo does not find the terminal under the /dev/pts directory, it performs a breadth-first search of /dev...The attacker may then create a symbolic link to the newly-created device in a world-writable directory under /dev, such as /dev/shm," an alert on the sudo project website reads.
"This file will be used as the command's standard input, output and error when an SELinux role is specified on the sudo command line. If the symbolic link under /dev/shm is replaced with a link to another file before [sudo opens it], it is possible to overwrite an arbitrary file by writing to the standard output or standard error. This can be escalated to full root access by rewriting a trusted file such as /etc/shadow or even /etc/sudoers."
The vulnerability, which affects Sudo 1.8.6p7 through 1.8.20 and marked as high severity, has already been patched in Sudo 1.8.20p1, and users are recommended to update their systems to the latest release.
Red Hat yesterday pushed out patches for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server. Debian has also released fixes for its Wheezy, Jessie and Sid releases and SUSE Linux has rolled out fixes for a number of its products.
Qualys Security said it would publish its Sudoer-to-root exploit once a maximum number of users have had time to patch their systems against the flaw.
| Vulnerability |
Lenovo Website has been Hacked | https://thehackernews.com/2015/02/lenovo-hacked.html | Lenovo.com, the official website of world's largest PC maker has been hacked.
At the time of writing, users visiting Lenovo.com website saw a teenager's slideshow and hacker also added song "Breaking Free" from High School Musical movie to the page background.
It appears that Lizard Squad hacking group is responsible for the cyber attack against Lenovo and it could be in retaliation to the Superfish malware incident.
It was revealed earlier this week that Lenovo had been pre-installing controversial 'Superfish' adware to its laptops which compromised the computer's encryption certificates to quietly include more ads on Google search.
In the Source code of the hacked webpage, description says,"The new and improved rebranded Lenovo website featuring Ryan King and Rory Andrew Godfrey"
Rory Andrew Godfrey and Ryan King have been previously identified as members of Lizard Squad Hacking Group. It is not clear whether anyone of them is involved in the hack or it is quite possible that attacker is trying to expose the real identity of the hacking crew.
The Superfish Malware raised serious security concerns about the company's move for breaking fundamental web security protocols, because anyone with the password that unlocks that single password-protected certificate authority would be able to completely bypass the computer's web encryption.
After that Facebook security team also discovered at least 12 more apps using the same "SSL hijacking" technology that gave the Superfish malware capability to evade rogue certificate.
Although Lenovo has admitted their mistake and distributing a Superfish removal tool for cleaning computer.
| Malware |
Orange.es Vulnerable To SQLi - Found by Invectus | https://thehackernews.com/2011/08/orangees-vulnerable-to-sqli-found-by.html | Orange.es Vulnerable To SQLi - Found by Invectus
People have never focused on SQL injection much, They have no clue that its the most common method which big companies are vulnerable to. Hacker with name "Invectus" , Found the SQL injection Vulnerability in Orange.es. Vulnerability has been exposed via Social Networks.
| Vulnerability |
Critical DoS Flaw found in OpenSSL — How It Works | https://thehackernews.com/2016/09/openssl-dos-attack.html | The OpenSSL Foundation has patched over a dozen vulnerabilities in its cryptographic code library, including a high severity bug that can be exploited for denial-of-service (DoS) attacks.
OpenSSL is a widely used open-source cryptographic library that provides encrypted Internet connections using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) or Transport Layer Security (TLS) for the majority of websites, as well as other secure services.
The vulnerabilities exist in OpenSSL versions 1.0.1, 1.0.2 and 1.1.0 and patched in OpenSSL versions 1.1.0a, 1.0.2i and 1.0.1u.
The Critical-rated bug (CVE-2016-6304) can be exploited by sending a large OCSP Status Request extension on the targeted server during connection negotiations, which causes memory exhaustion to launch DoS attacks, the OpenSSL Project said.
What is OCSP Protocol?
OCSP(Online Certificate Status Protocol), supported by all modern web browsers, is a protocol designed to perform verification and obtain the revocation status of a digital certificate attached to a website.
OCSP divided into client and server components. When an application or a web browser attempts to verify an SSL certificate, the client component sends a request to an online responder via HTTP protocol, which in turn, returns the status of the certificate, valid or not.
Reported by Shi Lei, a researcher at Chinese security firm Qihoo 360, the vulnerability affects servers in their default configuration even if they do not support OCSP.
"An attacker could use the TLS extension "TLSEXT_TYPE_status_request" and fill the OCSP ids with continually renegotiation," the researcher explained in a blog post.
"Theoretically, an attacker could continually renegotiation with the server thus causing unbounded memory growth on the server up to 64k each time."
How to Prevent OpenSSL DoS Attack
Administrators can mitigate damage by running 'no-ocsp.' Furthermore, servers using older versions of OpenSSL prior to 1.0.1g are not vulnerable in their default configuration.
Another moderate severity vulnerability (CVE-2016-6305) that can be exploited to launch denial of service attacks is fixed in the patch release, affecting OpenSSL 1.1.0 that was launched less than one month ago.
The team has also resolved a total of 12 low severity vulnerabilities in the latest versions of OpenSSL, but most of them do not affect the 1.1.0 branch.
It is worth noting that the OpenSSL Project will end support for OpenSSL version 1.0.1 on 31st December 2016, so users will not receive any security update from the beginning of 2017. Therefore users are advised to upgrade in order to avoid any security issues.
| Vulnerability |
Top 3 Focus Areas that can help you in Data Loss Prevention | https://thehackernews.com/2013/10/top-3-focus-areas-that-can-help-you-in.html | One of the most intimidating issues that gives nightmares to IT teams across organizations is data breaches or data loss. Typically, data loss happens when security is compromised and corporate sensitive data is accessed. It might fall under any of these categories:
Unauthorized, intentional or unintentional exfiltration of confidential information
Data spill or data leak
This can happen due to external security attacks like malware, hacking or sometimes even from an internal source such as a disgruntled employee. This calls for a data loss prevention (DLP) system in place that would help you contain and avoid the loss of data.
Data loss happens in many stages and can be broadly categorized into three categories:
Data in Motion: Data that moves through the network to the outside, in most cases using the Internet
Data at Rest: Data that rests in your database and other provisions for storage
Data at the Endpoints: Data at the endpoints of your network, say, data on USB and other plugged-in devices.
What is Data Loss Prevention?
DLP is a strategy to make sure that your sensitive data don't move outside of your network. It helps you reduce the risk of the disclosure of confidential information. With the continuous increase in cybercrime, it becomes all the more necessary to protect data breach across various stages.
Here are some focus areas that can help you minimize data loss:
1. Identify the Top Data Loss Scenarios
If you look into all the data loss scenarios thus far, you will be able to cull out a pattern as to which are the ones that have had the highest impact. Also there may be relatively minor data loss incidents but it might be occurring multiple times in a day.
Action item: Identify and classify data based on their sensitivity and keep an eye on their flow within the network and outside. Your classification can be based on the type of data as well, for example, customer data, financial data, etc. Once this is done, based on your security and compliance requirements, you need to build security policies. It is advisable to use a SIEM security tool that will correlate and alerts you in real time upon any security breach.
2. Actively respond to Security Incidents
Once the radar is lit up, security events, tend to pile up thick and fast. It is important to have a dedicated methodology to analyze and respond to all valid security events.
Action item: As you begin to monitor the log events in real time, you would be able to quickly spot security threats. You can deploy an efficient log management tool with active response technology that can help you mitigate and remediate violations and deliver automated responses based on the security incident.
3. Comply with Policy Regulations
If you are handling sensitive and confidential information, you need to be compliant with policy regulations such as FISMA, PCI DSS, HIPAA, etc. Based on the industry in which you operate. For example, if your business involves payment card transactions, you need to be PCI compliant as you are responsible for protecting the cardholder data when you receive it.
Action item: If you are PCI Compliant you need to encrypt the cardholder data with at least a 128 bit SSL certificate to meet this standard. It requires constant assessment and reporting and employees across different levels should get involved to make it effective. SIEM tools help you quickly uncover compliance policy violations by identifying attacks, and highlighting threats with real-time log analysis and powerful cross-device and cross-event correlation covering your entire infrastructure.
SolarWinds Log and Event Manager (LEM) help you quickly uncover policy violations and performs multiple event correlation to understand relationships between dramatically different activities. With it's with real-time log analysis and powerful cross-device/cross-event correlation, LEM lets you effectively identify and respond to threats in real time, rather than being reactive.
LEM also provides over 300 pre-built "audit-proven" templates so you can easily generate and schedule PCI and other regulatory compliance reports, as well as customize reports for your organization's specific needs.
Yaagneshwaran Ganesh - Product Marketing Specialist at SolarWinds, with a primary focus on Information Security. Experience across Sales, Market Research,etc.(Google+ Profile)
| Data_Breaches |
Attackers Abusing Citrix NetScaler Devices to Launch Amplified DDoS Attacks | https://thehackernews.com/2020/12/citrix-adc-ddos-attack.html | Citrix has issued an emergency advisory warning its customers of a security issue affecting its NetScaler application delivery controller (ADC) devices that attackers are abusing to launch amplified distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks against several targets.
"An attacker or bots can overwhelm the Citrix ADC [Datagram Transport Layer Security] network throughput, potentially leading to outbound bandwidth exhaustion," the company noted. "The effect of this attack appears to be more prominent on connections with limited bandwidth."
ADCs are purpose-built networking appliances whose function is to improve the performance, security, and availability of applications delivered over the web to end-users.
The desktop virtualization and networking service provider said it's monitoring the incident and is continuing to investigate its impact on Citrix ADC, adding "the attack is limited to a small number of customers around the world."
The issue came to light after multiple reports of a DDoS amplify attack over UDP/443 against Citrix (NetScaler) Gateway devices at least since December 19, according to Marco Hofmann, an IT administrator for a German software firm ANAXCO GmbH.
Datagram Transport Layer Security or DTLS is based on the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol that aims to provide secure communications in a way that's designed to thwart prevent eavesdropping, tampering, or message forgery.
Since DTLS uses the connectionless User Datagram Protocol (UDP) protocol, it's easy for an attacker to spoof an IP packet datagram and include an arbitrary source IP address.
Thus when the Citrix ADC is flooded with an overwhelming flux of DTLS packets whose source IP addresses are forged to a victim IP address, the elicit responses lead to an oversaturation of bandwidth, creating a DDoS condition.
Citrix is currently working to enhance DTLS to eliminate the susceptibility to this attack, with an expected patch to be released on January 12, 2021.
To determine if a Citrix ADC equipment is targeted by the attack, Cisco recommends keeping an eye on the outbound traffic volume for any significant anomaly or spikes.
Customers impacted by the attack, in the meantime, can disable DTLS while a permanent fix from Citrix is pending by running the following command on the Citrix ADC: "set vpn vserver <vpn_vserver_name> -dtls OFF."
| Cyber_Attack |
Here's how hackers are targeting Cisco Network Switches in Russia and Iran | https://thehackernews.com/2018/04/hacking-cisco-smart-install.html | Since last week, a new hacking group, calling itself 'JHT,' hijacked a significant number of Cisco devices belonging to organizations in Russia and Iran, and left a message that reads—"Do not mess with our elections" with an American flag (in ASCII art).
MJ Azari Jahromi, Iranian Communication and Information Technology Minister, said the campaign impacted approximately 3,500 network switches in Iran, though a majority of them were already restored.
The hacking group is reportedly targeting vulnerable installations of Cisco Smart Install Client, a legacy plug-and-play utility designed to help administrators configure and deploy Cisco equipments remotely, which is enabled by default on Cisco IOS and IOS XE switches and runs over TCP port 4786.
Some researchers believe the attack involves a recently disclosed remote code execution vulnerability (CVE-2018-0171) in Cisco Smart Install Client that could allow attackers to take full control of the network equipment.
However, since the hack apparently resets the targeted devices, making them unavailable, Cisco believes hackers have been merely misusing the Smart Install protocol itself to overwrite the device configuration, instead of exploiting a vulnerability.
"The Cisco Smart Install protocol can be abused to modify the TFTP server setting, exfiltrate configuration files via TFTP, modify the configuration file, replace the IOS image, and set up accounts, allowing for the execution of IOS commands," the company explains.
Chinese security firm Qihoo 360's Netlab also confirms that that hacking campaign launched by JHT group doesn't involve the recently disclosed code execution vulnerability; instead, the attack is caused due to the lack of any authentication in the Cisco smart install protocol, reported in March last year.
According to Internet scanning engine Shodan, more than 165,000 systems are still exposed on the Internet running Cisco Smart Install Client over TCP port 4786.
Since Smart Install Client has been designed to allow remote management on Cisco switches, system administrators need to enable it but should limit its access using Interface access control lists (ACLs).
Administrators who do not use the Cisco Smart Install feature at all should disable it entirely with the configuration command—"no vstack."
Although recent attacks have nothing to do with CVE-2018-0171, admins are still highly recommended to install patches to address the vulnerability, as with technical details and proof-of-concept (PoC) already available on the Internet, hackers could easily launch their next attack leveraging this flaw.
| Cyber_Attack |
Exploit Packs updated with New Java Zero-Day vulnerability | https://thehackernews.com/2013/01/exploit-packs-updated-with-new-java.html | A new Java 0-day vulnerability has been discovered, already wind in use by an exploit pack, taking advantage of a fresh zero-day vulnerability in Java and potentially letting hackers take over users' machines.
Java 7 Update 10 and earlier contain an unspecified vulnerability that can allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable system. The flaw was first spotted by 'Malware Don't Need Coffee' blog. This vulnerability is being attacked in the wild, and is reported to be incorporated into exploit kits.
This exploit is already available in two Exploit Packs, that is available for $700 a quarter or $1,500 for a year. Similar tactics were used in CVE-2012-4681, which was discovered last August. Source of this new Exploit available to download Here.
The two most popular exploits packs used by hackers to distribute malware, the BlackHole Exploit Kit and the Cool Exploit Kit already having this latest Java Zero-Day exploit. Blackhole kit is usually installed on compromised websites and uses vulnerabilities in web browsers and other software to inject malware into visitors' PCs.
The creator of Blackhole, who uses the nickname 'Paunch,' announced yesterday on several Under web forums that the Java zero-day was a 'New Year's Gift,' to customers who use his exploit kit. Vulnerability was later confirmed by security firm AlienVault Labs, "On the other hand we expect a Metasploit module in the upcoming days as it has been happening during the last year as well as most of the exploit kits adopting this new zeroday sooner than later."
Last option for readers, deactivate the Java plugin in their browsers without delay.
| Vulnerability |
New Apache backdoor serving Blackhole exploit kit | https://thehackernews.com/2013/04/new-apache-backdoor-serving-blackhole.html | A new sophisticated and stealthy Apache backdoor meant to drive traffic to malicious websites serving Blackhole exploit kit widely has been detected by Sucuri recently. Researchers claimed that this backdoor affecting hundreds of web servers right now.
Dubbed Linux/Cdorked.A, one of the most sophisticated Apache backdoors we have seen so far. The backdoor leaves no traces of compromised hosts on the hard drive other than its modified httpd binary, thereby complicating forensics analysis. All of the information related to the backdoor is stored in shared memory.
The configuration is pushed by the attacker through obfuscated HTTP requests that aren't logged in normal Apache logs. The HTTP server is equipped with a reverse connect backdoor that can be triggered via a special HTTP GET request. This means that no command and control information is stored anywhere on the system.
ESET researchers analyzed the binary and discovered a nasty hidden backdoor. In the Linux/Cdorked binary all the important or suspicious strings are encrypted and analysed version contains a total of 70 strings that are encoded this way.
The backdoor will check if the URL, the server name, or the referrer matches any of the following strings : '*adm*', '*webmaster*', '*submit*', '*stat*', '*mrtg*', '*webmin*', '*cpanel*', '*memb*', '*bucks*', '*bill*', '*host*', '*secur*', '*support*'. This is probably done to avoid sending malicious content to administrators of the website, making the infection harder to spot.
Researchers also found 23 commands in Linux/Cdorked.A that can be sent to the server via a POST to a specially crafted URL ie. command list : 'DU', 'ST', 'T1′, 'L1′, 'D1′, 'L2′, 'D2′, 'L3′, 'D3′, 'L4′, 'D4′, 'L5′, 'D5′, 'L6′, 'D6′, 'L7′, 'D7′, 'L8′, 'D8′, 'L9′, 'D9′, 'LA', 'DA'.
When attackers get full root access to the server, they can do anything they want. From modifying configurations, to injecting modules and replacing binaries.
| Malware |
Hackers Could Turn Pre-Installed Antivirus App on Xiaomi Phones Into Malware | https://thehackernews.com/2019/04/xiaomi-antivirus-app.html | What could be worse than this, if the software that's meant to protect your devices leave backdoors open for hackers or turn into malware?
Researchers today revealed that a security app that comes pre-installed on more than 150 million devices manufactured by Xiaomi, China's biggest and world's 4th largest smartphone company, was suffering from multiple issues that could have allowed remote hackers to compromise Xiaomi smartphones.
According to CheckPoint, the reported issues resided in one of the pre-installed application called, Guard Provider, a security app developed by Xiaomi that includes three different antivirus programs packed inside it, allowing users to choose between Avast, AVL, and Tencent.
Since Guard Provider has been designed to offer multiple 3rd-party programs within a single app, it uses several Software Development Kits (SDKs), which according to researchers is not a great idea because data of one SDK cannot be isolated and any issue in one of them could compromise the protection provided by others.
"The hidden disadvantages in using several SDKs within the same app lie in the fact that they all share the app context and permissions," the security firm says.
"While minor bugs in each individual SDK can often be a standalone issue, when multiple SDKs are implemented within the same app it is likely that even more critical vulnerabilities will not be far off."
It turns out that before receiving the latest patch, Guard Provider was downloading antivirus signature updates through an unsecured HTTP connection, allowing man-in-the-middle attackers sitting on open WiFi network to intercept your device's network connection and push malicious updates.
"Once connected to the same Wi-Fi network as the victim – say, in public places i.e. at restaurants, coffee shops, or malls – the attacker would be able to gain access to the phone owner's pictures, videos, and other sensitive data, or inject malware," CheckPoint told The Hacker News.
However, the actual attack scenario is not as straightforward as it may sound.
As explained by CheckPoint, researchers successfully achieved remote code execution on the targeted Xiaomi device after exploiting four separate issues in two different SDKs available in the app.
The attack basically leveraged the use of unsecured HTTP connection, a path-traversal vulnerability and lack of digital signature verification while downloading and installing an antivirus update on the device.
"It is completely understandable that users would put their trust in smartphone manufacturers' preinstalled apps, especially when those apps claim to protect the phone itself," the firm says.
Check Point reported the issues to the company and confirmed that Xiaomi has now fixed the issues in the latest version of its Guard Provider app.
So, if you own a Xiaomi smartphone you should make sure your security software is up-to-date.
| Vulnerability |
New High-Severity Vulnerability Reported in Pulse Connect Secure VPN | https://thehackernews.com/2021/05/new-high-severity-vulnerability.html | Ivanti, the company behind Pulse Secure VPN appliances, has published a security advisory for a high severity vulnerability that may allow an authenticated remote attacker to execute arbitrary code with elevated privileges.
"Buffer Overflow in Windows File Resource Profiles in 9.X allows a remote authenticated user with privileges to browse SMB shares to execute arbitrary code as the root user," the company said in an alert published on May 14. "As of version 9.1R3, this permission is not enabled by default."
The flaw, identified as CVE-2021-22908, has a CVSS score of 8.5 out of a maximum of 10 and impacts Pulse Connect Secure versions 9.0Rx and 9.1Rx. In a report detailing the vulnerability, the CERT Coordination Center said the issue stems from the gateway's ability to connect to Windows file shares through a number of CGI endpoints that could be leveraged to carry out the attack.
"When specifying a long server name for some SMB operations, the 'smbclt' application may crash due to either a stack buffer overflow or a heap buffer overflow, depending on how long of a server name is specified," CERT/CC detailed in a vulnerability note published on Monday, adding it was able to trigger the vulnerable code by targeting the CGI script '/dana/fb/smb/wnf.cgi.'
Pulse Secure customers are recommended to upgrade to PCS Server version 9.1R.11.5 when it becomes available. In the interim, Ivanti has published a workaround file ('Workaround-2105.xml') that can be imported to disable the Windows File Share Browser feature by adding the vulnerable URL endpoints to a blocklist and thus activate necessary mitigations to protect against this vulnerability.
It bears noting that users running PCS versions 9.1R11.3 or below would need to import a different file named 'Workaround-2104.xml,' necessitating that the PCS system is running 9.1R11.4 before applying the safeguards in 'Workaround-2105.xml.'
While Ivanti has recommended turning off Windows File Browser on the Admin UI by disabling the option 'Files, Window [sic]' for specific user roles, CERT/CC found the steps were inadequate to protect against the flaw during its testing.
"The vulnerable CGI endpoints are still reachable in ways that will trigger the 'smbclt' application to crash, regardless of whether the 'Files, Windows' user role is enabled or not," it noted.
"An attacker would need a valid DSID and 'xsauth' value from an authenticated user to successfully reach the vulnerable code on a PCS server that has an open Windows File Access policy."
The disclosure of a new flaw arrives weeks after the Utah-based IT software company patched multiple critical security vulnerabilities in Pulse Connect Secure products, including CVE-2021-22893, CVE-2021-22894, CVE-2021-22899, and CVE-2021-22900, the first of which was found to be actively exploited in the wild by at least two different threat actors.
| Vulnerability |
Tesla Model S Hack Could Let Thieves Clone Key Fobs to Steal Cars | https://thehackernews.com/2018/09/tesla-model-s-remote-hack.html | Despite having proper security measures in place to protect the driving systems of its cars against cyber attacks, a team of security researchers discovered a way to remotely hack a Tesla Model S luxury sedans in less than two seconds.
Yes, you heard that right.
A team of researchers from the Computer Security and Industrial Cryptography (COSIC) group of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the KU Leuven University in Belgium has demonstrated how it break the encryption used in Tesla's Model S wireless key fob.
With $600 in radio and computing equipment that wirelessly read signals from a nearby Tesla owner's fob, the team was able to clone the key fob of Tesla's Model S, open the doors and drive away the electric sports car without a trace, according to Wired.
"Today it's very easy for us to clone these key fobs in a matter of seconds," Lennert Wouters, one of the KU Leuven researchers, told Wired. "We can completely impersonate the key fob and open and drive the vehicle."
Also Read: Researchers Show How to Steal Tesla Car by Hacking into Owner's Smartphone.
Tesla's Key Fob Cloning Attack Takes Just 1.6 Seconds
Like most automotive keyless entry systems, Tesla Model S key fobs also work by sending an encrypted code to a car's radios to trigger it to unlock the doors, enabling the car to start.
However, the KU Leuven researchers found that Tesla uses a keyless entry system built by a manufacturer called Pektron, which uses a weak 40-bit cipher to encrypt those key fob codes.
The researchers made a 6-terabyte table of all possible keys for any combination of code pairs, and then used a Yard Stick One radio, a Proxmark radio, and a Raspberry Pi mini-computer, which cost about $600 total—not bad for a Tesla Model S though—to capture the required two codes.
With that table and those two codes, the team says it can calculate the correct cryptographic key to spoof any key fob in just 1.6 seconds. To understand more clearly, you can watch the proof of concept video demonstration which shows the hack in action.
The team reported the issue to Tesla last year, but the company addressed it in June 2018 by upgrading the weak encryption. Last month, the company also added an optional PIN as an additional defense.
Tesla Paid $10,000 Bounty to the Researchers
After the story broke, Tesla was criticised on Twitter for using a weak cipher, though a member of the KU Leuven team appreciated Tesla for quickly responding to their report and fixing the issue,, on the same time, accused other vehicle makers using keyless entry tech from the same vendor and ignoring reports.
Also Read: Hackers take Remote Control of Tesla's Brakes and Door locks from 12 Miles Away.
"Everybody is making fun of Tesla for using a 40-bit key (and rightly so)," Cryp·tomer tweeted. "But Tesla at least had a mechanism we could report to and fixed the problem once informed. McLaren, Karma, and Triumph used the same system and ignored us."
Tesla paid the KU Leuven team a $10,000 bounty and plans to add the researchers' names to its Hall of Fame.
| Vulnerability |
KILLER! Unpatched WinRAR Vulnerability Puts 500 Million Users At Risk | https://thehackernews.com/2015/09/winrar-vulnerability.html | Beware Windows Users!
A new dangerous unpatched Zero-day Vulnerability has been detected in the latest version of WinRAR affects over millions of users worldwide.
According to Mohammad Reza Espargham, a security researcher at Vulnerability-Lab, the stable version of WinRAR 5.21 for Windows computers is vulnerable to Remote Code Execution (RCE) flaw.
WinRAR is one of the most popular utility program used to compress and decompress files with more than 500 Million installations worldwide.
The WinRAR RCE vulnerability lie under the 'High Severity' block, and scores 9 on CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System).
HOW WINRAR VULNERABILITY WORKS?
Let's take a look at its actions.
The vulnerability can be used by any attacker smartly to insert a malicious HTML code inside the "Text to display in SFX window" section when the user is creating a new SFX file.
WinRAR SFX is an executable compressed file type containing one or more file and is capable of extracting the contents of its own.
According to proof-of-concept video published by Espargham, latest WinRAR vulnerability allows remote hackers to execute arbitrary code on a victim's computer when opening an SFX file (self-extracting file).
Successful Exploitation requires low user interaction, and results in compromising users':
System
Network
Devic
The major disadvantage arises because of SFX files, as they start functioning as soon as the user clicks on them. Therefore, users cannot identify and verify if the compressed executable file is a genuine WinRAR SFX module or a harmful one.
NO PATCH YET AVAILABLE
Unfortunately, there is no patch yet available to fix this vulnerability. However, Windows users are advised to:
Use an alternate archiving software
Do not click files received from unknown sources
Use strict authentication methods to secure your system
"As for any exe file, users must run SFX archives only if they are sure that such archive is received from a trustworthy source. SFX archive can silently run any exe file contained in an archive, and this is the official feature needed for software installers", WinRAR developer team at RARLAB quoted.
| Vulnerability |
16 Million German Users' Data Compromised in mysterious Botnet Malware attack | https://thehackernews.com/2014/01/16-million-german-users-data.html | A New day begins with a Cup of Coffee and with new massive Data Breach News.
This time in Germany, the Digital identities of about 16 million online users had been stolen, and posing a risk to their accounts linked to social media and other services.
Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) discovered a security breach after running an analysis of the botnet network of computers infected with malware.
The compromised accounts have email addresses as their username and also the passwords were stolen, that could also be sold to spammers and people looking to "phish" account holders.
Until now it hasn't been known that how and when the analysis was carried out and who exactly were involved behind this massive data breach, as the BSI refused to give details on the source of the information.
Authorities have set up a German-language website which allows users to enter their email address and check whether their email accounts are compromised or not.
The officer advised those with compromised email addresses to change their passwords of "social networking sites, online shops, email accounts and other online services;" and check their computers for malware and viruses and also assured the user that they are taking necessary security measures against it.
An Agency spokesman, Tim Griese, said about half the accounts have '.de' domain-name endings, denoting German-based accounts, and it appears the majority of users are in Germany, RT reports.
Data breach has become a burning issue these days, and a problem which is skyrocketing!
| Data_Breaches |
Zero-Day Exploits for Stealing OS X and iOS Passwords | https://thehackernews.com/2015/06/iphone-password-hacking.html | I think you'll agree with me when I say: Apple devices are often considered to be more safe and secure than other devices that run on platforms like Windows and Android, but a recent study will make you think twice before making this statement.
A group of security researchers have uncovered potentially deadly zero-day vulnerabilities in both iOS and OS X operating systems that could put iPhone/iPad or Mac owners at a high risk of cyber attacks.
Researchers have created and published a malicious app on the App Store that was able to siphon users' personal data from the password storing Keychain in Apple's OS X, as well as steal passwords from iCloud, banking and email accounts.
Dubbed XARA (cross-app resource access), the malware exploit app was able to bypass the OS X sandboxing mechanisms that are supposedly designed to prevent an app from accessing the credentials, contacts, and other important data related to other apps.
The Consequences are Dire!
In their paper, titled "Unauthorized Cross-App Resource Access on MAC OS X and iOS" [PDF], the researchers claim that once installed, their app can obtain data from applications such as Dropbox, Facebook and Evernote, along with the popular messaging app WeChat, and even siphon passwords from 1Password.
"The consequences are dire," researchers wrote in the paper. "For example, on the latest Mac OS X 10.10.3, our sandboxed app successfully retrieved from the system's keychain the passwords and secret tokens of iCloud, email and all kinds of social networks...bank and Gmail passwords from Google Chrome."
The Researchers also noted that the hack attack is only possible when the attributes of the victim's keychain item are predictable. However, most of the services share the same name across Keychain stores.
The Keychain issue stems from its inability to verify which app owns a credential in Keychain, and even the OS doesn't check for any suspicious activity.
Bypassed Apple's App Store Security Checks
The malicious app was also able to bypass the Apple's App store security checks that are designed to ensure one app can not gain access to other apps' data without permission.
However, the more worrisome part regarding the malicious app is that it was approved by Apple for placement in its App Store, which is supposed to be pre-examine by Apple security engineers for potentially malicious apps.
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The zero-day flaws discovered by the Indiana University boffins Xing; Xiaolong Bai; XiaoFeng Wang; and Kai Chen joined Tongxin Li, of Peking University, and Xiaojing Liao, of Georgia Institute of Technology, was reported to Apple last October, but the company requested a 6 month period before making it public.
However, according to their paper, the issues persist and millions of Apple users can still be affected by these zero-day flaws.
How to Protect your Devices
A system-wide update to Apple's OS X and iOS is the only way to protect yourself fully against these vulnerabilities, the researchers said. However, we are patiently waiting to hear from Apple that how it's planning to resolve this huge issue.
To protect yourselves against such vulnerabilities, users of all operating system platforms are advised to limit the apps they install on their devices to those that are needed and explicitly trusted.
| Malware |
Google Apps Flaw Allowed Hacker to Hijack Account and Disable Two-factor Authentication | https://thehackernews.com/2015/01/google-account-hacking.html | A critical cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the Google Apps administrator console allowed cyber criminals to force a Google Apps admins to execute just about any request on the https://admin.google.com/ domain.
The Google Apps admin console allows administrators to manage their organization's account. Administrators can use the console to add new users, configure permissions, manage security settings and enable Google services for your domain. The feature is primarily used by many businesses, especially those using Gmail as the e-mail service for their domain.
The XSS flaw allowed attackers to force the admin to do the following actions:
Creating new users with "super admin" rights
Disabling two-factor authentication (2FA) and other security measures from existing accounts or from multiple domains
Modifying domain settings so that all incoming e-mails are redirected to addresses controlled by the attacker
Hijack an account/email by resetting the password, disabling 2FA, and also removing login challenges temporarily for 10 minutes
This new zero-day vulnerability was discovered and privately reported by application security engineer Brett Buerhaus to Google on September 1 and the company fixed the flaw within 17 days. In exchange for the report, Google paid the researcher $5,000 as a reward under its bug bounty program.
According to the researcher, when users access a service that hasn't been configured for their domain, they are presented with a "ServiceNotAllowed" page. This page allows users to switch between accounts in order to log in to the service.
However, when one of the accounts was selected, a piece of JavaScript code was executed in an attempt to redirect the user's Web browser. JavaScript code could be supplied by the user in the "continue" request parameter of the URL, which allowed XSS attacks.
"The continue request parameter is fairly common request variable in the Google login flow," Buerhaus explained in a blog post published on Wednesday. "This is the only page that I could find that did not validate the URL passed into it. This allowed you to craft Cross-Site Scripting attacks by using "javascript:" as part of the URL and it would execute when the browser location is redirected."
Patching the vulnerability on the 17th day after reported to the company shows the search engine giant's concern to secure its software and users as well.
However, the recent vulnerability troubles visited Microsoft exposed one-after-one three serious zero-day vulnerabilities in Windows 7 and 8.1 operating systems, reported by Google's Project Zero team. Microsoft wasn't able to fix the security flaws in its software even after a three-month-long time period provided to the company.
| Vulnerability |
New Rapidly-Growing IoT Botnet Threatens to Take Down the Internet | https://thehackernews.com/2017/10/iot-botnet-malware-attack.html | Just a year after Mirai—biggest IoT-based malware that caused vast Internet outages by launching massive DDoS attacks—completed its first anniversary, security researchers are now warning of a brand new rapidly growing IoT botnet.
Dubbed 'IoT_reaper,' first spotted in September by researchers at firm Qihoo 360, the new malware no longer depends on cracking weak passwords; instead, it exploits vulnerabilities in various IoT devices and enslaves them into a botnet network.
IoT_reaper malware currently includes exploits for nine previously disclosed vulnerabilities in IoT devices from following manufactures:
Dlink (routers)
Netgear (routers)
Linksys (routers)
Goahead (cameras)
JAWS (cameras)
AVTECH (cameras)
Vacron (NVR)
Researchers believe IoT_reaper malware has already infected nearly two million devices and growing continuously at an extraordinary rate of 10,000 new devices per day.
This is extremely worrying because it took only 100,000 infected devices for Mirai to took down DNS provider Dyn last year using a massive DDoS attack.
Besides this, researchers noted that the malware also includes more than 100 DNS open resolvers, enabling it to launch DNS amplification attacks.
"Currently, this botnet is still in its early stages of expansion. But the author is actively modifying the code, which deserves our vigilance." Qihoo 360 researchers say.
Meanwhile, researchers at CheckPoint are also warning of probably same IoT botnet, named "IoTroop," that has already infected hundreds of thousands of organisations.
"It is too early to guess the intentions of the threat actors behind it, but with previous Botnet DDoS attacks essentially taking down the Internet, it is vital that organisations make proper preparations and defence mechanisms are put in place before attack strikes." researchers said.
According to CheckPoint, IoTroop malware also exploits vulnerabilities in Wireless IP Camera devices from GoAhead, D-Link, TP-Link, AVTECH, Linksys, Synology and others.
At this time it is not known who created this and why, but the DDoS threat landscape is skyrocketing and could reach tens of terabits-per-second in size.
"Our research suggests we are now experiencing the calm before an even more powerful storm. The next cyber hurricane is about to come." CheckPoint researchers warned.
You need to be more vigilant about the security of your smart devices. In our previous article, we have provided some essential, somewhat practical, solutions to protect your IoT devices.
Also Read: How Drones Can Find and Hack Internet-of-Things Devices From the Sky.
| Malware |
Oracle Database stealth password cracking vulnerability | https://thehackernews.com/2012/09/oracle-database-stealth-password.html | Oracle suffered with serious vulnerability in the authentication protocol used by some Oracle databases. This Flaw enable a remote attacker to brute-force a token provided by the server prior to authentication and determine a user's password.
A researcher - Esteban Martinez Fayo, a researcher with AppSec tomorrow will demonstrate a proof-of-concept attack.
Martinez Fayo and his team first reported the bugs to Oracle in May 2010. Oracle fixed it in mid-2011 via the 11.2.0.3 patch set, issuing a new version of the protocol. "But they never fixed the current version, so the current 11.1 and 11.2 versions are still vulnerable," Martinez Fayo says, and Oracle has no plans to fix the flaws for version 11.1.
The first step in the authentication process when a client contacts the database server is for the server to send a session key back to the client, along with a salt. The vulnerability enables an attacker to link a specific session key with a specific password hash.
There are no overt signs when an outsider has targeted the weakness, and attackers aren't required to have "man-in-the-middle" control of a network to exploit it. "Once the attacker has a Session Key and a Salt (which is also sent by the server along with the session key), the attacker can perform a brute force attack on the session key by trying millions of passwords per second until the correct one is found. This is very similar to a SHA-1 password hash cracking. Rainbow tables can' t be used because there is a Salt used for password hash generation, but advanced hardware can be used, like GPUs combined with advanced techniques like Dictionary hybrid attacks, which can make the cracking process much more efficient."
"I developed a proof-of-concept tool that shows that it is possible to crack an 8 characters long lower case alphabetic password in approximately 5 hours using standard CPUs."
Because the vulnerability is in a widely deployed product and is easy to exploit, Fayo said he considers it to be quite dangerous.
| Vulnerability |
Microsoft, Adobe and Mozilla issue Critical Security Patch Updates | https://thehackernews.com/2015/05/microsoft-adobe-mozilla-update.html | This week you have quite a long list of updates to follow from Microsoft, Adobe as well as Firefox.
Despite announcing plans to kill its monthly patch notification for Windows 10, the tech giant has issued its May 2015 Patch Tuesday, releasing 13 security bulletins that addresses a total of 48 security vulnerabilities in many of their products.
Separately, Adobe has also pushed a massive security update to fix a total of 52 vulnerabilities in its Flash Player, Reader, AIR and Acrobat software.
Moreover, Mozilla has fixed 13 security flaws in its latest stable release of Firefox web browser, Firefox 38, including five critical flaws.
First from the Microsoft's side:
MICROSOFT PATCH TUESDAY
Three out of 13 security bulletins issued by the company are rated as 'critical', while the rest are 'important' in severity, with none of these vulnerabilities are actively exploited at this time.
The affected products include Internet Explorer (IE), current versions of Windows (and its components), Office, SharePoint Server, Silverlight and the .NET Framework as well.
The bulletin rated Critical bundles:
MS15-943 – A cumulative update for Internet Explorer that patches 22 separate flaws, including 14 memory corruption bugs and the most critical one that include remote code execution vulnerabilities.
MS15-944 – It patches two flaws in the OpenType and TrueType font rendering code that could be exploited in .NET Framework, Lync, Office, Windows, and Silverlight. The most critical of which includes remote code execution.
MS15-945 – It patches six flaws in Windows Journal program, which comes installed by default in all supported client versions of Windows. All the six flaws could allow remote code execution.
The bulletin rated Important bundles:
MS15-946 – Fixes a pair of vulnerabilities in Office allowing remote code execution.
MS15-947 – Patches one remote code execution vulnerability in SharePoint.
MS15-948 – Patches a pair of vulnerabilities in the .NET Framework allowing denial of service (DoS) and elevation of privilege.
MS15-949 – Fixes one elevation of privilege bug in Silverlight.
MS15-950 – Fixes one elevation of privilege flaw in Windows Service Control Manager.
MS15-951 –MS15-951 – Patches six vulnerabilities in Windows Kernel allowing information disclosure and elevation of privilege.
MS15-952 – Fixes one security bypass flaw in Windows Kernel.
MS15-953 – Patches a pair of security bypass vulnerabilities in VBScript.
MS15-954 – Fixes one denial of service (DoS) bug in the Microsoft Management Console.
MS15-955 – Patches one vulnerability in Schannel allowing for information disclosure.
The company advised users and administrators to test and install the updates as soon as possible. This May Patch Tuesday 2015 could be one of the last patch Tuesdays by Microsoft.
ADOBE PATCH UPDATES
On Wednesday, Adobe released its recent set of security updates for the Adobe Flash Player, Adobe Reader and Acrobat software, including patches for some critical vulnerabilities.
Adobe patches at least 18 security holes in its Flash Player and AIR software. The updates are available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux versions of the software, addressing "vulnerabilities that could potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system," according to the company.
The Flash Player update addresses:
A number of remote code execution vulnerabilities
Four memory corruption vulnerabilities
One heap overflow vulnerability
One integer overflow bug
Three type confusion flaws
One use-after-free vulnerability
A time-of-check time-of-use (TOCTOU) race condition that bypasses Protected Mode in Internet Explorer
Validation bypass issues that could be exploited to write arbitrary data to the file system under user permissions
Memory leak vulnerabilities that could be used to bypass ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization)
One security bypass vulnerability that could lead to information leaks
Affected Flash Player Versions:
Adobe Flash Player version 17.0.0.169 and earlier
Adobe Flash Player version 13.0.0.281 and earlier 13.x versions
Adobe Flash Player version 11.2.202.457 and earlier 11.x versions
AIR Desktop Runtime 17.0.0.144 and earlier versions
AIR SDK and SDK & Compiler 17.0.0.144 and earlier versions
Adobe Reader and Acrobat update addresses:
Critical remote code execution vulnerabilities
Five use-after-free vulnerabilities
Heap-based buffer overflow vulnerabilities
One buffer overflow vulnerability
Ten memory corruption vulnerabilities
Affected Adobe Reader and Acrobat Versions:
Adobe Reader XI (11.0.10) and earlier 11.x versions
Reader X (10.1.13) and earlier 10.x versions
Acrobat XI (11.0.10) and earlier 11.x versions
Acrobat X (10.1.13) and earlier 10.x versions
Adobe Acrobat Reader DC has not been affected in this security update.
Also, the latest Adobe update also resolves:
Various methods to bypass JavaScript API execution restrictions
A memory leak issue
A null-pointer dereference issue that could lead to a denial-of-service (DoS) attacks
An information disclosure bug in the handling of XML external entities that could lead to information disclosure
The company recommends its users to accept automatic updates for the Adobe Flash Player desktop runtime for Windows and Mac OS X when prompted or update manually via the Adobe Flash Player Download Center.
MOZILLA UPDATES
Mozilla addresses five critical flaws, five high-risk bugs and two moderately rated vulnerabilities in its Firefox 38.
One of the serious problems it fixes resides in Firefox 38 – An out-of-bounds read and write vulnerability in the JavaScript subset "asm.js" during the validation procedure, whose exploitation could lead an attacker to read parts of the memory that may contain users sensitive data.
Among the critical vulnerabilities is a buffer overflow in the way the browser parses compressed XML, which have been fixed in the latest Firefox 38 update.
The most important update in Firefox is that the new version of the browser includes a feature that enables the use of DRM-enabled (Digital Rights Management-enabled) video content in Firefox.
The latest Firefox browser update also includes an integration with the Adobe Content Decryption Module (CDM), allowing users to play DRM-wrapped content in HTML5 video tag.
"A year ago, we announced the start of efforts to implement support for a component in Firefox that would allow content wrapped in Digital Rights Management (DRM) to be played within the HTML5 video tag. This was a hard decision," the company states in the blog post.
"As we explained then, we are enabling DRM to provide our users with the features they require in a browser and allow them to continue accessing premium video content. We don't believe DRM is a desirable market solution, but it's currently the only way to watch a sought-after segment of content."
To reimburse, Mozilla has also designed a sandbox that encompasses the CDM, restricting interaction with sensitive parts of the system and the browser. In addition, the Mozilla developer is also offering a version of Firefox 38 that doesn't include the CDM component from the browser.
| Vulnerability |
Intel CPUs Vulnerable to New 'SGAxe' and 'CrossTalk' Side-Channel Attacks | https://thehackernews.com/2020/06/intel-sgaxe-crosstalk-attacks.html | Cybersecurity researchers have discovered two distinct attacks that could be exploited against modern Intel processors to leak sensitive information from the CPU's trusted execution environments (TEE).
Called SGAxe, the first of the flaws is an evolution of the previously uncovered CacheOut attack (CVE-2020-0549) earlier this year that allows an attacker to retrieve the contents from the CPU's L1 Cache.
"By using the extended attack against the Intel-provided and signed architectural SGX enclaves, we retrieve the secret attestation key used for cryptographically proving the genuinity of enclaves over the network, allowing us to pass fake enclaves as genuine," a group of academics from the University of Michigan said.
The second line of attack, dubbed CrossTalk by researchers from the VU University Amsterdam, enables attacker-controlled code executing on one CPU core to target SGX enclaves running on a completely different core, and determine the enclave's private keys.
A TEE, like Intel's Software Guard Extensions (SGX), refers to a secure enclave, an area within a processor that ensures confidentiality and integrity of code and data. It offers safeguards against the modification of sensitive software and data by malicious actors that may have broken into the target (virtual) machine.
SGAxe Attack: Extracting Sensitive Data From SGX Enclaves
SGAxe builds on the CacheOut speculative execution attack to steal SGX data. According to the researchers, while Intel took steps to address side-channel attacks against SGX via several microcode updates and new architectures, the mitigations have proven ineffective.
That exploit, as a result, results in a transient execution attack that can recover SGX cryptographic keys from a fully updated Intel machine, which is trusted by Intel's attestation server.
Attestation is a mechanism offered as part of SGX that lets enclaves prove to third parties that they have been correctly initialized on a genuine Intel processor. The idea is to ensure that the software running inside the CPU hasn't tampered with and to have increased confidence that the software is running inside the enclave.
"In a nutshell, we use CacheOut to recover the sealing keys from within the address space of Intel's production quoting enclave," the researchers stated. "Finally, we use the recovered sealing keys in order to decrypt the long term storage of the quoting enclave, obtaining the machines EPID attestation keys."
By breaking this trust, SGAxe makes it easy for an attacker to create a rogue enclave that passes Intel's attestation mechanism, resulting in loss of security guarantees.
"With the machine's production attestation keys compromised, any secrets provided by [the] server are immediately readable by the client's untrusted host application, while all outputs allegedly produced by enclaves running on the client cannot be trusted for correctness," the researchers said. "This effectively renders SGX-based DRM applications useless, as any provisioned secret can be trivially recovered."
Although Intel issued fixes for CacheOut back in January via a microcode update to OEM vendors and subsequently via BIOS updates to end-users, mitigations for SGAxe will require patching the root cause behind CacheOut (aka L1D Eviction Sampling).
"It is important to note that SGAxe relies on CVE-2020-0549 which has been mitigated in microcode (confirmed by the researchers in their updated CacheOut paper) and distributed out to the ecosystem," Intel said in a security advisory.
The chipmaker will also perform a Trusted Compute Base (TCB) recovery to invalidate all previously signed attestation keys.
"This process will ensure that your system is in a secure state such that your system is able to use remote attestation again," the researchers stated.
CrossTalk Attack: Leaking Information Across CPU cores
CrossTalk (CVE-2020-0543), the second SGX exploit, is what the VU University calls an MDS (Microarchitectural Data Sampling) attack. It takes advantage of a "staging" buffer that's readable across all CPU cores to mount transient execution attacks across the cores and extract the entire ECDSA private key of a secure enclave running on a separate CPU core.
"The staging buffer retains the results of previously executed offcore-instructions across all CPU cores," the researchers observed. "For instance, it contains the random numbers returned by the offcore hardware DRNG, bootguard status hashes, and other sensitive data."
Put differently, CrossTalk works by reading the staging buffer during transient execution in order to leak sensitive data accessed by previously executed victim instructions.
The fact that the buffer retains output from RDRAND and RDSEED instructions makes it possible for an unauthorized party to track the random numbers generated, and therefore compromise the cryptographic operations that underpin the SGX enclave, including the aforementioned remote attestation process.
With Intel CPUs released from 2015 to 2019, counting Xeon E3 and E CPUs, susceptible to the attacks, VU University researchers said it shared with Intel a proof-of-concept demonstrating the leakage of staging buffer content in September 2018, followed by a PoC implementing cross-core RDRAND/RDSEED leakage in July 2019.
"Mitigations against existing transient execution attacks are largely ineffective," the team summarized. "The majority of current mitigations rely on spatial isolation on boundaries which are no longer applicable due to the cross-core nature of these attacks. New microcode updates which lock the entire memory bus for these instructions can mitigate these attacks—but only if there are no similar problems which have yet to be found."
In response to the findings, Intel addressed the flaw in a microcode update distributed to software vendors yesterday after a prolonged 21-month disclosure period due to the difficulty in implementing a fix.
The company has recommended users of affected processors update to the latest version of the firmware provided by system manufacturers to address the issue.
| Vulnerability |
Facebook Hacked — 10 Important Updates You Need To Know About | https://thehackernews.com/2018/09/facebook-account-hacked.html | If you also found yourself logged out of Facebook on Friday, you are not alone.
Facebook forced more than 90 million users to log out and back into their accounts in response to a massive data breach.
On Friday afternoon, the social media giant disclosed that some unknown hackers managed to exploit three vulnerabilities in its website and steal data from 50 million users and that as a precaution, the company reset access tokens for nearly 90 million Facebook users.
We covered a story yesterday based upon the information available at that time.
Facebook Hack: 10 Important Updates You Need To Know About
However, in a conference call [Transcript 1, Transcript 2] with reporters, Facebook vice president of product Guy Rosen shared a few more details of the terrible breach, which is believed to be the most significant security blunder in Facebook's history.
Here's below we have briefed the new developments in the Facebook data breach incident that you need to know about:
1.) Facebook Detected Breach After Noticing Unusual Traffic Spike — Earlier this week, Facebook security team noticed an unusual traffic spike on its servers, which when investigated revealed a massive cyber attack, that had been ongoing since 16 September, aimed at stealing data of millions of Facebook users.
2.) Hackers Exploited Total 3 Facebook Vulnerabilities — The hack was accomplished using three distinct bugs of Facebook in combination.
The first bug incorrectly offered users a video uploading option within certain posts that enables people to wish their friends 'Happy Birthday,' when accessed on "View As" page.
The second bug was in the video uploader that incorrectly generated an access token that had permission to log into the Facebook mobile app, which is otherwise not allowed.
The third bug was that the generated access token was not for you as the viewer, but for the user that you were looking up, giving attackers an opportunity to steal the keys to access an account of the person they were simulating.
3.) Hackers Stole Secret Access Tokens for 50 Million Accounts — The attackers walked away with secret access tokens for as many as 50 million Facebook users, which could then be used to take over accounts.
Access Tokens "are the equivalent of digital keys that keep people logged in to Facebook, so they don't need to re-enter their password every time they use the app."
4.) Your Facebook Account Password Has Not Been Compromised, But, Wait! — The good news is that the attack did not reveal your Facebook account passwords, but here's the bad news — it's not even required.
An application or an attacker can use millions of secret access tokens to programmatically fetch information from each account using an API, without actually having your password or two-factor authentication code.
5.) Hackers Downloaded Users' Private Information Using Facebook API — Although it is not clear how many accounts and what personal information was accessed by hackers before Facebook detected the incident, the year-old vulnerabilities had left all your personal information, private messages, photos and videos wide open for hackers.
"Since we've only just started our investigation, we have yet to determine whether these accounts were misused or any information accessed," the company said.
6.) Your "Logged in as Facebook" Accounts at 3rd-Party Apps/Websites Are At Risk — Since secret tokens enabled attackers to access accounts as the account holder themselves, it could have allowed them to access other third-party apps that were using Facebook login — a feature that lets you sign up for, and log in to, other online services using your Facebook credentials.
7.) Facebook Reset Access Tokens for 90 Million Accounts — In response to the massive breach, Facebook reset access tokens for nearly 50 million affected Facebook accounts and an additional 40 million accounts, as a precaution. This means that nearly 90 Million Facebook users were logged out of their accounts on Friday.
8.) Check Active Sessions on Facebook to Find If Your Account Have Been Hacked — Many Facebook users have noticed unknown IP addresses from foreign locations that apparently had accessed their account unauthorizedly.
You can head on to "Account Settings → Security and Login → Where You're Logged In" to review the list of devices and their location that have accessed your Facebook account.
If you found any suspicious session that you never logged in, you can revoke back the access in just one click.
9.) Breach Isn't Connected to the Hacker Who Pledged to Delete Zuckerberg's Personal Page — Earlier this week, a Taiwanese hacker, Chang Chi-Yuang, claimed that he would demonstrate a critical zero-day vulnerability in Facebook by broadcasting himself hacking Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook page on Sunday.
However, it is not clear whether the latest Facebook breach has anything to do with Chang's hack, at least Facebook does not believe so.
Besides this, Chang Chi-Yuang Today says he canceled the stream and reported the bug to Facebook.
10.) Facebook Faces Class-Action Lawsuit Over The Massive Hack — Just after the news of the breach went public, two residents, Carla Echavarria from California and another from Virginia, filed a class-action complaint against the social media giant in US District Court for the Northern District of California.
Both allege that Facebook failed to protect their and additional potential class members data from going into wrong hands due to its lack of proper security practices.
The social media giant has already been facing criticism on handling of user data and its privacy policies in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which personal data of 87 million Facebook users was sold to and misused by a data-mining firm without their consent.
Facebook has already reset account logins for tens of millions of users and is also advising affected users who had Instagram or Oculus accounts linked to their Facebook account to de-link and than link those accounts again so that the access tokens can be changed.
The vulnerabilities exploited by the hackers are fixed, and Facebook is working with the FBI to investigate the security incident, which has impacted approximately 2.5% of Facebook users of its over 2 billion user base.
Since the investigation is still in the early stages, Facebook has yet to determine whether the attackers misused the stolen access tokens for 50 million accounts or if any information was accessed.
| Data_Breaches |
Iran still on target of 'Mahdi' malware after detection | https://thehackernews.com/2012/09/iran-still-on-target-of-mahdi-malware.html | In JULY Kaspersky Lab and Seculert revealed the presence of a new cyber-espionage weapon known targeting users in the Middle East. Despite the recent uncovering of the 'Madhi' malware that has infected several hundred computers in the Middle East, researchers say the virus is continuing to spread.
The malware, known as 'Mahdi' or 'Madi', was originally discovered by Seculert. In addition to stealing data from infected Windows computers, it is also capable of monitoring email and instant messages, recording audio, capturing keystrokes and taking screenshots of victims' computers.
Working together, researchers at Seculert and Kaspersky sinkholed the malware's command and control servers and monitored the campaign. What they found was a targeted attack that impacted more than 800 victims in Iran, Israel and other countries from around the globe.
Israeli security company Seculert said it had identified about 150 new victims over the past six weeks as developers of the Mahdi virus had changed the code to evade detection by anti-virus programs. That has brought the total number of infections found so far to nearly 1,000, the bulk of them in Iran.
"These guys continue to work," Seculert Chief Technology Officer Aviv Raff said via telephone from the company's headquarters in Israel. "This tells us that the attackers are still doing a very effective job with this surveillance malware," he said.
The majority of the victims were in Iran, and many were found to be businesspeople working on Iranian and Israeli critical-infrastructure projects, Israeli financial institutions, Middle East engineering students or various government agencies in the region. All totaled, multiple gigabytes of data are believed to have been uploaded from victims' computers, researchers have said.
Seculert and Kaspersky dubbed the campaign Mahdi after a term referring to the prophesied redeemer of Islam because evidence suggests the attackers used a folder with that name as they developed the software to run the project.
They also included a text file named mahdi.txt in the malicious software that infected target computers.
| Malware |
China's New Law Requires Vendors to Report Zero-Day Bugs to Government | https://thehackernews.com/2021/07/chinas-new-law-requires-researchers-to.html | The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) has issued new stricter vulnerability disclosure regulations that mandate software and networking vendors affected with critical flaws to mandatorily disclose them first-hand to the government authorities within two days of filing a report.
The "Regulations on the Management of Network Product Security Vulnerability" are expected to go into effect starting September 1, 2021, and aim to standardize the discovery, reporting, repair, and release of security vulnerabilities and prevent security risks.
"No organization or individual may take advantage of network product security vulnerabilities to engage in activities that endanger network security, and shall not illegally collect, sell or publish information on network product security vulnerabilities," Article 4 of the regulation states.
In addition to banning sales of previously unknown security weaknesses, the new rules also forbid vulnerabilities from being disclosed to "overseas organizations or individuals" other than the products' manufacturers, while noting that the public disclosures should be simultaneously accompanied by the release of repairs or preventive measures.
"It is not allowed to deliberately exaggerate the harm and risk of network product security vulnerabilities, and shall not use network product security vulnerability information to carry out malicious speculation or fraud, extortion and other illegal and criminal activities," Article 9 (3) of the regulation reads.
Furthermore, it also prohibits the publication of programs and tools to exploit vulnerabilities and put networks at a security risk.
| Vulnerability |
Cryptolocker Ransomware makes different Bitcoin wallet for each victim | https://thehackernews.com/2013/10/Cryptolocker-Ransomware-Bitcoin-malware-remove-software.html | When you're online, you expose your vulnerability to malicious virus that have been growing in virulence and ferocity over the last few years.
Among home PC users, you may think that you protected from malicious software by Installing an effective, trusted antivirus solution, but most if the Antivirus solutions still it merely finds and removes any known threats.
But what if someday you turn on your system and you will find a pop up window with a warning that says "Your system is Locked and Important drives are encrypted and there is no way out unless you will not Pay fine".
This is what Ransomware malware does to your system. Ransomware is the most serious emerging threat in the virtual world of computing devices. Ransomware is a kind of malware which is designed to Block access to the computing system or can lock your system until an amount of money is paid through Internet banking.
Ransomware is usually installed when you open a malicious attachment in an email message or when you click on a malicious link in an email message, instant message, a social networking site or other websites.
A new piece of ransomware is giving Internet users one more reason to think twice before they click a link in an email. You may have read about the Cryptolocker malware in our previous stories on The Hacker News, a new ransomware Trojan that encrypts your files and demands money to return them.
Cryptolocker has been infecting PCs around the world and effectively holding the files within for ransom. Cryptolocker first made an appearance last month. Malware Researcher 'Octavian Minea' from Bitdefender explains the detailed inner workings of the Cryptolocker Ransomware, lets have a look:
The Cryptolocker ransomware gets installed with the help of Zbot variant (Zbot, is a malware toolkit that allows a cybercriminal to build his own Trojan Horse. Zeus, which is sold on the black market, allows non-programmers to purchase the technology they need to carry out cybercrimes.) and after installation it immediately adds itself to the Startup folder with a random name. Then it tries to establish connection with its command and control server on remote location using the Internet and send a 192 byte encrypted packet:
"version=1&id=1&name={COMPUTER_NAME}&group={GROUP_NAME}&lid={LOCATION_ID}"
Where {GROUP_NAME} seems to be related to the time of compilation of the malware and an example for {LOCATION_ID} is 'en-US'.
On successful connection, the server generates a pair of 2048-bit RSA public and private key and the malware receives only the public key and a newly generated Bitcoin address. For each victim, only the Cryptolocker authors have access to the decryption private keys.
The received information from the server gets stored in the system registry at:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Cryptolocker_NUMBER\
Which contain the values PublicKey, Version Info with Bitcoin address and the command and control server address in an encrypted form.
Cryptolocker uses a solid encryption scheme as well, which so far appears unbreakable. It begins encrypting documents on any local or network storage drive, which are in any of these formats:
*.odt*.ods*.odp*.odm*.odc*.odb*.doc*.docx*.docm*.wps*.xls*.xlsx*.xlsm*.xlsb*.xlk*.ppt*.pptx*.pptm*.mdb*.accdb*.pst*.dwg*.dxf*.dxg*.wpd*.rtf*.wb2*.pdf*.mdf*.dbf*.psd*.pdd*.eps*.ai*.indd*.cdr????????.jpg????????.jpeimg_*.jpg*.dng*.3fr*.arw*.srf*.sr2*.bay*.crw*.cr2*.dcr*.kdc*.erf*.mef*.mrw*.nef*.nrw*.orf*.raf*.raw*.rwl*.rw2*.r3d*.ptx*.pef*.srw*.x3f*.der*.cer*.crt*.pem*.pfx*.p12*.p7b*.p7c
An AES key is generated for each file to be encrypted, the file is then AES-encrypted and the AES key is itself encrypted using the public key. The encrypted AES key is then appended to the encrypted file.
While the public key is stored on the computer, the private key is stored on the command-and-control server; CryptoLocker demands a payment with either a MoneyPak card or Bitcoin to recover the key and begin decrypting files, and threatens to delete the private key if a payment is not received within 3 days.
"Payment of the ransom can generally be performed in Bitcoins, although some Cryptolocker variants also accept payment methods Ukash, CashU or, only in the US of A, in Money Pack prepaid cards which can only be bought with cash. All these payment methods are practically anonymous." he said.
Due to the extremely large key size it uses, analysts and those affected by the worm have considered CryptoLocker to be extremely difficult to repair.
Users who have their files locked up by the ransomware are currently paying $300 to $700 to the criminals who run the virus to gain control of their computer. Once the victim pays the ransom, the transaction ID must be entered and purportedly verifications ensue. If a private key is sent by the server, it is added to the registry and the decryption process begins.
So far, there have been no reports of the hackers reinfecting a machine once the ransom has been paid. However, the attackers give you roughly three days to pay them, otherwise your data is gone forever, especially if they do not perform regular and off-site backups.
Today's cybercriminals are using more sophisticated attacks, such as ransomware and spear phishing, which yield them more money per attack than ever before. A sample study of 1000 users by Symantec found India to be the ransomware capital of Asia Pacific with 11% victims of virtual extortion.
There are several free ways to help protect your computer against ransomware and other malware:
Make sure to keep all of the software on your computer up to date.
Make sure that automatic updating is turned on to get all the latest security updates.
Never open any attachment unless you know who it's from and why they are sending it.
Use secure connections for sensitive transactions.
Use strong alphanumeric and symbol passwords.
Use virtual keyboard for internet banking.
Common sense is another good weapon in the fight against viruses.
Swati Khandelwal - Working at 'The Hacker News'. Social Media Lover and Gadgets Girl. Speaker, Cyber Security Expert and Technical Writer.(Google+ Profile)
| Malware |
Android Privilege Escalation Flaws leave Billions of Devices vulnerable to Malware Infection | https://thehackernews.com/2014/03/android-privilege-escalation-flaws.html | Android - a widely used Smartphone platform offered by Google is once again suspected to affect its users with malicious software that puts their android devices at risk. This time the vulnerabilities occur in the way Android handle the updates to add new flavors to your device.
Researchers from Indiana University and Microsoft have discovered [Paper PDF] a new set of Android vulnerabilities that is capable to carry out privilege escalation attacks because of the weakness in its Package Management Service (PMS) that puts more than one billion Android devices at risk.
The researchers dubbed the new set of security-critical vulnerabilities as Pileup flaws which is a short for privilege escalation through updating, that waylays inside the Android PMS and intensifies the permissions offered to malicious apps whenever an android update occurs, without informing users.
The research was carried out by Indiana University Bloomington researchers, Luyi Xing, Xiaorui Pan, Kan Yuan and XiaoFeng Wang, with the help of Rui Wang of Microsoft.
Six different Pileup vulnerabilities have been found by the researchers within the Android PMS, those are present in all Android Open Source Project versions, including more than 3,500 customized versions of Android developed by handset makers and carriers.
"Every few months, an update is released, which causes replacement and addition of tens of thousands of files on a live system. Each of the new apps being installed needs to be carefully configured to set its attributes within its own sandboxes and its privileges in the system, without accidentally damaging existing apps and the user data they keep," the researchers wrote. "This complicates the program logic for installing such mobile updates, making it susceptible to security-critical flaws."
The researchers also found that by exploiting the Pileup vulnerabilities, a hacker can not only control the system permission and signature but also their settings. Moreover an attacker could use the malicious app to access and steal the device data, including, sensitive user information such as activity logs, user credentials, Contacts, Messages etc.
"A distinctive and interesting feature of such an attack is that it is not aimed at a vulnerability in the current system. Instead, it exploits the flaws in the updating mechanism of the "future" OS, which the current system will be upgraded to," the researchers wrote. "More specifically, though the app running on a lower version Android, the adversary can strategically claim a set of carefully selected privileges or attributes only available on the higher OS version."
In short, it means that, if an attacker sends the malicious app update and if the permission don't exist in the older version of the android that is added to the new version; the malicious app will silently acquire the permissions and when the device is upgraded to the newer version, the pileup flaws will be automatically exploited.
"A third-party package attribute or property, which bears the name of its system counterpart, can be elevated to a system one during the updating shuffle-up where all apps are installed or reinstalled, and all system configurations are reset," the researcher wrote. "Also, when two apps from old and new systems are merged as described above, security risks can also be brought in when the one on the original system turns out to be malicious."
During the update, first the PMS will install all new and existing system apps and then will proceed to install third party apps from the old OS and during the installation of malicious app packed inside PMS, the device will recognize and silently grants all the permissions that malicious app requests, as it supposes that these permissions are with an existing app and have already been approved by the user.
"With the help of a program analyzer, our research discovered 6 such Pileup flaws within Android Package Manager Service and further confirmed their presence in all AOSP (Android Open Source Project) versions and all 3,522 source code versions customized by Samsung, LG and HTC across the world that we inspected, which strongly indicates their existence in all Android devices in the market."
Moreover detecting the critical flaws, the researchers have developed a new scanner app called SecUP that search for malicious apps already on a device designed to exploit Pileup vulnerabilities. Scanning tool inspects already installed Android application packages (APKs) on the device, in an attempt to identify those that will cause privilege escalations during an update, the paper stated.
The SecUP scanning tool consists of an automated vulnerability detector, a program verification tool for Java that discovers the Pileup flaws within the source code of different Android versions and a threat analyzer that automatically scans thousands of OS images.
"The detector verifies the source code of PMS (from different Android versions) to identify any violation of a set of security constraints, in which we expect that the attributes, properties (name, permission, UID, etc.) and data of a third-party app will not affect the installation and configurations of system apps during an update," the researchers explained. "A Pileup flaw is detected once any of those constraints are breached."
All the six vulnerabilities have been reported to Google by the researchers, from which one of it has been fixed by them.
| Malware |
PayPal Vulnerability Allows Hackers to Steal All Your Money | https://thehackernews.com/2015/08/paypal-money-hacking-tool.html | A critical security vulnerability has been discovered in the global e-commerce business PayPal that could allow attackers to steal your login credentials, and even your credit card details in unencrypted format.
Egypt-based researcher Ebrahim Hegazy discovered a Stored Cross Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the Paypal's Secure Payments domain.
As it sounds, the domain is used to conduct secure online payments when purchasing from any online shopping website. It enables buyers to pay with their payment cards or PayPal accounts, eliminating the need to store sensitive payment information.
However, it is possible for an attacker to set up a rogue online store or hijacked a legitimate shopping website, to trick users into handing over their personal and financial details.
How the Stored XSS Attack Works?
Hegazy explains a step by step process in his blog post, which gives a detailed explanation of the attack.
Here's what the researcher calls the worst attack scenario:
An attacker need to set up a rogue shopping site or hijack any legitimate shopping site
Now modify the "CheckOut" button with a URL designed to exploit the XSS vulnerability
Whenever Paypal users browse the malformed shopping website, and click on "CheckOut" button to Pay with their Paypal account, they'll be redirected to the Secure Payments page
The page actually displays a phishing page where the victims are asked to enter their payment card information to complete the purchasing
Now on clicking the Submit Payment Button, instead of paying the product price (let's say $100), the Paypal user will pay the attacker amount of attacker's choice
Video Demonstration
The researcher has also provided a proof-of-concept (PoC) video that shows attack in work. You can watch the video here.
Hegazy reported this serious security vulnerability to the PayPal team on June 19th, and the team confirmed the security hole, which was fixed on August 25 – just over two months later.
PayPal has also rewarded Hegazy with a bug bounty of $750 for his findings, which is the company's maximum bug bounty payout for XSS vulnerabilities.
| Vulnerability |
Mouabad Android Malware calling to Premium numbers; Generating revenue for its Master | https://thehackernews.com/2013/12/mouabad-android-malware-calling-to.html | Android platform is a primary target for malware attacks from few years and during 2013, more than 79% of mobile operating malware threats are taking place on Android OS.
I have been working on Android Malware architectures since last two years and created 100's of sample of most sophisticated malware for demo purpose.
Till now we have seen the majority of Android malware apps that earn money for their creators by sending SMS messages to premium rate numbers from infected devices.
Security researchers at Lookout identified an interesting monetized Android Malware labeled as 'Mouabad', that allow a remote attacker to make phone calls to premium-rate numbers without user interaction from C&C servers by sending commands to the malware.
The technique is not new, but infection from such app notified first time in the wild. The variant dubbed MouaBad.p., is particularly sneaky and to avoid detection it waits to make its calls until a period of time after the screen turns off and the lock screen activates.
"Mouabad.p also end the calls it makes as soon as a user interacts with their device (e.g. unlocks it). However, this malware variant does not appear to have the ability to modify call logs so a discerning victim could uncover Mouabad.p's dialing activity by checking their call histories."
Risk of infection is low, because the malware app works only on devices running Android version 3.1 or old and designed to mainly target Chinese-speaking users.
"Mouabad.p and other trojans that can financially harm users and effectively hide themselves underscore the need for sophisticated mobile malware protection."
Android architecture loophole contributes to the growth of Android malware. It basically can't identify the difference between a legit app i.e. Taking permissions to read your Contacts or SMS (i.e. True Caller), or a malicious applications (i.e. Trojans), or state-sponsored applications (i.e. WeChat). Neither Android architecture allows users to revoke the list of permissions they don't want to give to an application.
For now, If you own a Smartphone, I highly recommend you to install applications only from some trusted App Store i.e. Google Play.
| Malware |
Mac OS X Flashback Trojan is still alive, recently infected 22,000 Apple machines | https://thehackernews.com/2014/01/mac-os-x-flashback-trojan-is-still.html | The Flashback Trojan, the most sophisticated piece of malware that infected over 600,000 Apple's Macs systems back in April, 2012 is still alive and has infected about 22,000 machines recently, according to the researchers from Intego.
For a refresh, Flashback Trojan was first discovered in September 2011, basically a trojan horse that uses a social engineering to trick users into installing a malicious Flash player package.
Once installed, the Flashback malware injects a code into that web browser and other applications like Skype to harvest passwords and other information from those program's users. The Trojan targets a known vulnerability in Java on Mac OS X systems.
The system gets infected after the user redirects to a compromised website, where a malicious javascript code to load the exploit with Java applets. Then an executable file is saved on the local machine, which is used to download and run malicious code from a remote location.
It took Apple months to recognize the severity of this Mac malware threat, which first appeared in the Fall of 2011. However, Apple released the patch and updated the specific introduction about the operating system, "It doesn't get PC viruses" to "It's built to be safe." on the Apple website. Intego said:
The Apple Product Security Response team took serious actions in 2012 to mitigate the threat using XProtect and other security updates (including a Malware Removal Tool), however, the botnet count was only divided by six according to our sinkhole.
Now in 2014, Intego researcher Abbati claims that Flashback botnet is still alive and is silently "adrift."
Intego purchased some of the command and control (C&C) server domain names to monitor the Flashback threat that infected hundreds of thousands of Macs. Beginning January 2, we studied those domains and our sinkhole servers recorded all connections from Macs where Flashback is still active and trying to contact the C&C servers.
Below is a screenshot of the Apache Server log:
On April 2012, the Mac world was stunned to learn that the Flashback Trojan had infected millions of machines. The Flashback Ad-clicking the component tool that caused infected Macs to view sponsored links that had the potential to generate millions of dollars in fraudulent ad revenue. In addition, it has the capability to do much more, including sending spam, engaging in denial-of-service attacks, or logging passwords.
To protect your computer from contracting the virus now, download Apple's latest software update or use Apple's official 'Flashback malware removal tool'. Other easiest way to detect and remove this malware from your Mac system is to download F-Secure's Flashback removal tool.
| Malware |
Georgia Tech Data Breach Exposes 1.3 Million Users' Personal Data | https://thehackernews.com/2019/04/georgia-tech-data-breach.html | The Georgia Institute of Technology, well known as Georgia Tech, has confirmed a data breach that has exposed personal information of 1.3 million current and former faculty members, students, staff and student applicants.
In a brief note published Tuesday, Georgia Tech says an unknown outside entity gained "unauthorized access" to its web application and accessed the University's central database by exploiting a vulnerability in the web app.
Georgia Tech traced the first unauthorized access to its system to December 14, 2018, though it's unclear how long the unknown attacker(s) had access to the university database containing sensitive students and staff information.
The database contained names, addresses, social security numbers, internal identification numbers, and date of birth of current and former students, faculty and staff, and student applicants.
However, the University has launched a forensic investigation to determine the full extent of the breach.
"The information illegally accessed by an unknown outside entity was located on a central database. Georgia Tech's cybersecurity team is conducting a thorough forensic investigation to determine precisely what information was extracted from the system, which may include names, addresses, social security numbers, and birth dates," the note published on the University website reads.
The University's IT team discovered the web app vulnerability at the end of last month when it noticed a significant performance impact.
"Application developers for the Institute noticed a significant performance impact in one of its web applications and began an investigation on March 21, 2019," Georgia Tech says in the FAQs detailing the incident.
"During this investigation, it was determined the performance issue was the result of a security incident."
Georgia Tech has since patched the vulnerability and already started notifying potentially impacted individuals via email.
The University is also "coordinating with consumer reporting agencies and the University System of Georgia to determine what protections will be provided" to the affected individuals.
Georgia Tech has also notified the U.S. Department of Education and University System of Georgia (USG) and is expected to release more information soon.
"We continue to investigate the extent of the data exposure and will share more information as it becomes available. We apologize for the potential impact on the individuals affected and our larger community. We are reviewing our security practices and protocols and will make every effort to ensure that this does not happen again," the University said.
| Data_Breaches |
Another iPhone lockscreen bypass vulnerability found in iOS 7.02 | https://thehackernews.com/2013/09/another-iphone-lockscreen-bypass.html | Here we go again! Earlier this week, Apple released iOS 7.0.2 just to fix some Lockscreen bugs in iOS 7 and but a researcher has found a new Lockscreen bug in new iOS 7.0.2.
This new Lockscreen bug is found by Dany Lisiansky, and he uploaded a proof of concept video on YouTube with the complete step by step guide.
Unlike the previous bugs it will not expose your Email, Photos, Facebook and Twitter but allows attackers to access your phone call history, voicemails and entire list of contacts.
A step by step guide released by iDownloadblog:
Make a phone call (with Siri / Voice Control)
Click the FaceTime button
When the FaceTime App appears, click the Sleep button
Unlock the iPhone
Answer and End the FaceTime call at the other end
Wait a few seconds
Done. You are now in the phone app
Video demonstration
It would be easy for someone who knows you or your love partner or your business partner to obtain your phone and call themselves from it to take advantage of this trick and they may only gain access to the Phone app.
Fixing this bug is pretty simple, Disable the Siri in Lockscreen by navigating to "Settings –> General –> Passcode –> Siri" and disable it there.
Also read that how an Iranian group defeated the iPhone Fingerprinting scanner Touch ID again, which allows them to unlock an iPhone device with multiple Fingerprints.
Post by The Hacker News.
| Vulnerability |
All Smartwatches are vulnerable to Hackers | https://thehackernews.com/2015/07/smartwatch-hacking.html | Do you own a Smartwatch? If yes, then how safe it is? There are almost 100 percent chances that you own a vulnerable Smartwatch.
Computer manufacturer Hewlett-Packard is warning users of smartwatches including Apple Watch and Samsung Gear that their wearable devices are vulnerable to cyber attacks.
In a study, HP's Fortify tested today's top 10 smartwatches for security features, such as basic data encryption, password protection and privacy concerns.
The most shocking part of the study was that –
Not even a Single Smartwatch Found to be 100 percent Safe
Security experts found that 100 percent of wearable devices contained at least one serious security vulnerability that could make the devices vulnerable to hackers.
With the increase in the adoption of smartwatches, manufacturers need to pay closer attention to the customers' security because these wearable devices could potentially open doors to new threats to personal and sensitive information.
"As the adoption of Smartwatches accelerates, the platform will become vastly more attractive to those who would abuse that access, making it critical that we take precautions when transmitting personal data or connecting Smartwatches into corporate networks," Jason Schmitt, general manager at HP's Security Fortify said in a statement.
The study [PDF], no doubt, had included Smart watches by Apple, Pebble, Samsung and Sony, as it claims to have picked top 10 smartwatches.
Here's the list of issues reported by HP:
1. Lack of transport encryption – Though all products implemented transport encryption using SSL/TLS, 40 percent of devices found to be either vulnerable to the POODLE attack, allowing the use of weak cyphers, or still using SSL v2.
2. Insecure Interfaces – Three out of ten smartwatches used cloud-based web interfaces and all of them were vulnerable to account harvesting. This allowed unlimited login attempts, helping hackers guess passwords.
3. Insufficient User Authentication/Authorization – Three out of ten smartwatches completely failed to offer Two-Factor authentication, or the ability to lock accounts after 3 to 5 failed password attempts.
4. Insecure Software/Firmware – 7 out of 10 smartwatches had issues with firmware updates. The wearable devices, including smartwatches, often did not receive encrypted firmware updates, but many updates were signed to help prevent malicious firmware updates from being installed. While a lack of encryption did not allow the files to be downloaded and analyzed.
5. Privacy Concerns – Smartwatches also demonstrate a risk to personal security as well as privacy. All the tested devices collected some form of personal information, including username, address, date of birth, gender, heart rate, weight and other health information.
The experts said it would not disclose the names of smartphone manufacturers whose watches they had tested, but they are working with vendors to "build security into their products before they put them out to market."
Meanwhile, HP urges users to not connect their smartwatches to the sensitive access control functions like cars or homes unless strong authorization is offered.
| Cyber_Attack |
New OSX/Imuler Variant Targeting Tibetan Activists | https://thehackernews.com/2012/11/new-osximuler-variant-targeting-tibetan.html | Researchers over at Intego have recently discovered a new variant of OSX/Imuler the data-stealing Mac malware, detected as OSX/Imuler.E which is believed to be targeting Tibetan rights activists.
"This backdoor Trojan family was first discovered in September 2011 as a Mac PDF Trojan horse and has been targeting activist organizations with emails containing what appear to be pictures. Each variant has tried different tactics, either trying to scare or entice their target into opening the file." explained.
The cyber criminals behind the campaign are relying on the fact that by default, Mac OS X doesn't display full file extensions, and therefore are attempting to trick end and corporate users into thinking that they're about the view a JPG image file.
The Imuler Trojan has two main methods of stealing information, It searches the system for user data OR It can also take screenshots. Then, This data is then uploaded to the controller's server.
Last week, Thousands of Tibetans have protested in western China, demanding independence and the return of exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama.
We always recommend users that good idea to run antivirus software, even on a Mac.
| Malware |
Firefox Releases Critical Patch Update to Stop Ongoing Zero-Day Attacks | https://thehackernews.com/2019/06/mozilla-firefox-patch-update.html | Important Update [21 June 2019]—Mozilla on Thursday released another update Firefox version 67.0.4 to patch a second zero-day vulnerability.
If you use the Firefox web browser, you need to update it right now.
Mozilla earlier today released Firefox 67.0.3 and Firefox ESR 60.7.1 versions to patch a critical zero-day vulnerability in the browsing software that hackers have been found exploiting in the wild.
Discovered and reported by Samuel Groß, a cybersecurity researcher at Google Project Zero, the vulnerability could allow attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code on machines running vulnerable Firefox versions and take full control of them.
The vulnerability, identified as CVE-2019-11707, affects anyone who uses Firefox on desktop (Windows, macOS, and Linux) — whereas, Firefox for Android, iOS, and Amazon Fire TV are not affected.
According to an advisory, the flaw has been labeled as a type confusion vulnerability in Firefox that can result in an exploitable crash due to issues in Array.pop which can occur when manipulating JavaScript objects.
At the time of writing, neither the researcher nor Mozilla has yet released any further technical details or proof-of-concept for this flaw.
Through Firefox automatically installs latest updates and activate new version after a restart, users are still advised to ensure they are running the latest Firefox 67.0.3 and Firefox (Extended Support Release) 60.7.1 or later.
Update
The researcher later today shared a few more details about the flaw with The Hacker News, saying the reported flaw primarily leads to Universal Cross-site Scripting (UXSS) attacks, but if combined with a sandbox escape issue, it could also allow attackers to execute arbitrary code remotely on a targeted systems.
"I don't have any insights into the active exploitation part. I found and then reported the bug on April 15. The first public fix then landed about a week ago (sec fixes are held back until close to the next release):" Groß said on Twitter.
"The bug can be exploited for RCE but would then need a separate sandbox escape. However, most likely it can also be exploited for UXSS which might be enough depending on the attacker's goals."
| Vulnerability |
Cybersecurity Researchers Spotted First-Ever UEFI Rootkit in the Wild | https://thehackernews.com/2018/09/uefi-rootkit-malware.html | Cybersecurity researchers at ESET have unveiled what they claim to be the first-ever UEFI rootkit being used in the wild, allowing hackers to implant persistent malware on the targeted computers that could survive a complete hard-drive wipe.
Dubbed LoJax, the UEFI rootkit is part of a malware campaign conducted by the infamous Sednit group, also known as APT28, Fancy Bear, Strontium, and Sofacy, to target several government organizations in the Balkans as well as in Central and Eastern Europe.
Operating since at least 2007, Sednit group is a state-sponsored hacking group believed to be a unit of GRU (General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate), a Russian secret military intelligence agency. The hacking group has been associated with a number of high profile attacks, including the DNC hack just before the U.S. 2016 presidential election.
UEFI, or Unified Extensible Firmware Interface, a replacement for the traditional BIOS, is a core and critical firmware component of a computer, which links a computer's hardware and operating system at startup and is typically not accessible to users.
How Does LoJax UEFI Rootkit Work?
According to the ESET researchers, the LoJax malware has the ability to write a malicious UEFI module into the system's SPI flash memory, allowing BIOS firmware to install and execute malware deep inside the computer disk during the boot process.
"This patching tool uses different techniques either to abuse misconfigured platforms or to bypass platform SPI flash memory write protections," ESET researchers said in a blog post published today.
Since LoJax rootkit resides in the compromised UEFI firmware and re-infects the system before the OS even boots, reinstalling the operating system, formatting the hard disk, or even replacing the hard drive with a new one would not be sufficient to clean the infection.
Flashing the compromised firmware with legitimate software is the only way to remove such rootkit malware, which typically is not a simple task for most computer users.
First spotted in early 2017, LoJax is a trojaned version of a popular legitimate LoJack laptop anti-theft software from Absolute Software, which installs its agent into the system's BIOS to survive OS re-installation or drive replacement and notifies device owner of its location in case the laptop gets stolen.
According to researchers, the hackers slightly modified the LoJack software to gain its ability to overwrite UEFI module and changed the background process that communicates with Absolute Software's server to report to Fancy Bear's C&C servers.
Upon analyzing the LoJax sample, researchers found that the threat actors used a component called "ReWriter_binary" to rewrite vulnerable UEFI chips, replacing the vendor code with their malicious one.
"All the LoJax small agent samples we could recover are trojanizing the exact same legitimate sample of the Computrace small agent rpcnetp.exe. They all have the same compilation timestamp and only a few tens of bytes are different from the original one," ESET researchers said.
"Besides the modifications to the configuration file, the other changes include timer values specifying the intervals between connections to the C&C server."
LoJax is not the first code to hide in the UEFI chip, as the 2015 Hacking Team leak revealed that the infamous spyware manufacturer offered UEFI persistence with one of its products.
Also, one of the CIA documents leaked by Wikileaks last year gave a clear insight into the techniques used by the agency to gain 'persistence' on Apple Mac devices, including Macs and iPhones, demonstrating their use of EFI/UEFI and firmware malware.
However, according to ESET, the LoJax rootkit installation uncovered by its researchers is the first ever recorded case of a UEFI rootkit active in the wild.
How to Protect Your Computer From Rootkits
As ESET researchers said, there are no easy ways to automatically remove this threat from a system.
Since UEFI rootkit is not properly signed, users can protect themselves against LoJax infection by enabling the Secure Boot mechanism, which makes sure that each and every component loaded by the system firmware is properly signed with a valid certificate.
If you are already infected with such malware, the only way to remove the rootkit is to reflash the SPI flash memory with a clean firmware image specific to the motherboard, which is a very delicate process that must be performed manually and carefully.
Alternative to reflashing the UEFI/BIOS, you can replace the motherboard of the compromised system outright.
"The LoJax campaign shows that high-value targets are prime candidates for the deployment of rare, even unique threats. Such targets should always be on the lookout for signs of compromise," researchers wrote.
For more in-depth details about the LoJax root, you can head onto a white paper [PDF], titled the "LoJax: First UEFI rootkit found in the wild, courtesy of the Sednit group," published on Thursday by ESET researchers.
| Malware |
Lenovo Shipping PCs with Pre-Installed 'Superfish Malware' that Kills HTTPS | https://thehackernews.com/2015/02/lenovo-superfish-malware.html | One of the most popular computer manufacturers Lenovo is being criticized for selling laptops pre-installed with invasive marketing software, or malware that, experts say, opens up a door for hackers and cyber crooks.
The software, dubbed 'Superfish Malware', analyzes users' Internet habits and injects third-party advertising into websites on browsers such as Google Chrome and Internet Explorer based on that activities without the user's permission.
Security researchers recently discovered Superfish Malware presents onto new consumer-grade Lenovo computers sold before January of 2015. When taken out of the box for the first time, the adware gets activated and because it comes pre-installed, Lenovo customers might end up using it inadvertently.
SUPERFISH CERTIFICATE PASSWORD CRACKED
The Superfish Malware raised serious security concerns about the company's move for breaking fundamental web security protocols, carrying out "Man in the Middle" (MitM) attacks - impersonating the security certificates of encrypted websites in order to monitor users' behavior even on protected sites.
This would trouble Lenovo users because MitM attack can open a door for hackers to potentially compromise the sensitive information of any customer affected by Superfish - like passwords or banking details - because users' data isn't actually being protected.
Anyone with the password that unlocks that single password-protected certificate authority would be able to completely bypass the computer's web encryption.
According to a post by Errata Security's Robert David Graham, he cracked and published the password which was stored in the Superfish software's active memory and was trivial to extract. So, one could imagine the loss, if the same would be done by any hacker or cyber crook.
SUPERFISH MALWARE TEMPORARILY REMOVED
After the news fired up over the Internet and multiple users complained of popups and other unwanted behavior, the computer giant removed the Superfish Malware.
"We have temporarily removed Superfish from our consumer systems until such time as Superfish is able to provide a software build that addresses these issues. As for units already in market, we have requested that Superfish auto-update a fix that addresses these issues," a Lenovo community administrator, Mark Hopkins, wrote in late January.
Hopkins also defended the company from criticism over installing Superfish in the first place — but it didn't address the false HTTPS certificate problem. He also says that Lenovo users can refuse the terms and conditions when setting up their laptop in order to disable the software.
"To be clear, Superfish technology is purely based on contextual/image and not behavioral," Hopkins' statement reads. "It does not profile nor monitor user behavior. It does not record user information. It does not know who the user is."
SELF-SIGNED HTTPS CERTS RAISED MAJOR SECURITY CONCERNS
While other users on online forums are reporting that Superfish Malware actually installs its own self-signed certificate authority which effectively allows the company to snoop on secure connections. And if true, Superfish Malware could be far more dangerous than we had thought.
"A blatant man-in-the-middle attack malware breaking privacy laws. I have requested return of the laptop and refund as I find it unbelievable that ... Lenovo would facilitate such applications pre bundled with new laptops," the user wrote on the Lenovo forums.
Facebook engineering director Mike Shaver also warned about the invasive adware via his personal Twitter account, saying that he found SuperFish certificates posted by different users who had shared the same RSA key.
"Lenovo installs a MITM cert and proxy called SuperFish, on new laptops, so it can inject ads? Someone tell me that's not the world I'm in," Shaver tweeted.
LENOVO - IT'S JUST TO ENHANCE USERS' EXPERIENCE
The company this morning issued a weird statement addressing the controversy on the Lenovo computers. According to the computer giant, the Superfish software was "to help customers potentially discover interesting products while shopping."
"The relationship with Superfish is not financially significant," the statement reads. "Our goal was to enhance the experience for users. We recognize that the software did not meet that goal and have acted quickly and decisively."
What was my reaction on the fresh statement issued by the company? Oh! Come on Lenovo, we know the reality. May be you are one of the world's largest PC brands, but after all you are also a Chinese PC brand.
HOW TO REMOVE LENOVO SUPERFISH
In order to remove Lenovo Superfish Malware from your system, run the Microsoft Management Console (mmc.exe), and do the following:
Go to File and Click Add/Remove.
Choose Certificates, click Add.
Choose Computer Account, click Next
Choose Local Computer, click Finish
Click OK
Look under Trusted Root Certification Authorities -> Certificates
Find the one issued to Superfish and delete it.
LENOVO'S BAD HISTORY REGARDING BACKDOOR
This isn't first time, in past the computer giant was caught installing malware backdoors in its products and was also banned by different countries for same reasons.
In the mid of 2013, the spy agencies - the 'five eyes' alliance of the US, Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand - banned Lenovo for allegedly installing backdoor into Lenovo-brand circuit boards, along with other vulnerabilities discovered into the firmware.
| Malware |
DomainFactory Hacked—Hosting Provider Asks All Users to Change Passwords | https://thehackernews.com/2018/07/web-hosting-server-hack.html | Besides Timehop, another data breach was discovered last week that affects users of one of the largest web hosting companies in Germany, DomainFactory, owned by GoDaddy.
The breach initially happened back in last January this year and just emerged last Tuesday when an unknown attacker himself posted a breach note on the DomainFactory support forum.
It turns out that the attacker breached company servers to obtain the data of one of its customers who apparently owes him a seven-figure amount, according to Heise.
Later the attacker tried to report DomainFactory about the potential vulnerability using which he broke into its servers, but the hosting provider did not respond, and neither disclosed the breach to its customers.
In that situation, the attacker head on to the company's support forum and broke the news with sample data of a few customers as proof, which forced DomainFactory to immediately shut down the forum website and initiate an investigation.
Attacker Gains Access to a Large Number of Data
DomainFactory finally confirmed the breach last weekend, revealing that following personal data belonging to an unspecified number of its customers has been compromised.
Customer name
Company name
Customer account ID
Physical address
E-mail addresses
Telephone number
DomainFactory Phone password
Date of birth
Bank name and account number (e.g. IBAN or BIC)
Schufa score (German credit score)
Well, that's a whole lot of information, which can be used by cybercriminals for targeted social engineering attacks against the customers.
The forum has since been temporarily down, and DomainFactory said that a data feed of certain customer information, accessed by the attacker, was left open to external third parties after a system transition on January 29, 2018.
"We have notified the data protection authority and commissioned external experts with the investigation. The protection of the data of our customers is paramount, and we regret the inconvenience this incident causes, very much," the company said.
Change All of Your Passwords
DomainFactory is now advising its users to change passwords for all of the following services and applications "as a precautionary measure," and also change passwords for other online services where you use the same password.
Customer password
Phone password
Email passwords
FTP / Live disk passwords
SSH passwords
MySQL database passwords
Since the compromised data can be used for identity theft and to create direct debits for customers' bank account, users are also recommended to monitor their bank statements for any unauthorized transaction.
So far it is unclear how the attacker got into the Domainfactory servers, but the German publication said the attacker did not give an impression of selling the captured data or leaking it online.
| Data_Breaches |
$36,000 USD reward for wanted hacker | https://thehackernews.com/2012/12/36000-usd-reward-for-wanted-hacker.html | Japan's National Police Agency has offered a monetary reward for a wanted hacker, use programming languages like C# to create a virus called "iesys.exe" and Hijack systems of innocent people to post aggressive messages on Internet on behalf of Users.
Method called a "Syberian Post Office" to post messages to popular Japanese bulletin board. Hacker use cross-site request forgery exploit, that allow hackers to making online postings via innocent users automatically. The messages included warnings of plans for mass killings at an elementary school posted to a city website.
It is the first time that Japan's National Police Agency has offered a monetary reward for a wanted hacker and will pay up to 3 million yen (US$36,000). The case is an embarrassing one for the police, in which earlier this year four individuals were wrongly arrested after their PCs were hacked and used to post such messages on public bulletin boards.
"Up until now this type of reward was reserved for cases involving crimes like murder and arson, but the policy has recently been changed to include more types of crimes," an agency spokeswoman said.
| Malware |
iPad 2 iOS 5 Lock Screen Bypass Vulnerability [Video Demonstration] | https://thehackernews.com/2011/10/ipad-2-ios-5-lock-screen-bypass.html | iPad 2 iOS 5 Lock Screen Bypass Vulnerability
Marc Gurman at 9to5Mac has discovered a vulnerability on the iPad that allows for a limited bypass of the device's lockscreen. Anyone with an iPad Smart Cover can gain access to the previously-open app (or the home screen if no app was open).
By holding the power button to bring up the 'Power Off' screen, closing the smart cover, re-opening it, and clicking cancel, the attacker will be dropped into the screen that was open before the iPad was locked. If the attacker gets dropped into the home screen, then they'll be able to see the installed apps, but won't be able to open anything. If Safari or Mail (or any other app) was the open when the device was locked, then the attacker would have access to that app.
From a locked iPad 2:
1) Lock a password protected iPad 2
2) Hold down power button until iPad 2 reaches turn off slider
3) Close Smart Cover
4) Open Smart Cover
5) Click cancel on the bottom of the screen
This isn't the first security issue Apple has experienced since rolling out iOS 5. On the brand new iPhone 4S it has been discovered you can use Siri when a device is locked. Even if a passcode is required, Siri doesn't care and allows you to carry out functions such as sending email and text messages.
Protection Against the iPad 2 Lock Screen Bypass:
For the time being, iPad 2 users are encouraged to disable the "Smart Cover unlocking" feature found in Settings > General.
| Vulnerability |
Hackers Targeting Companies Involved in Covid-19 Vaccine Distribution | https://thehackernews.com/2020/12/hackers-targeting-companies-involved-in.html | A global spear-phishing campaign has been targeting organizations associated with the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines since September 2020, according to new research.
Attributing the operation to a nation-state actor, IBM Security X-Force researchers said the attacks took aim at the vaccine cold chain, companies responsible for storing and delivering the COVID-19 vaccine at safe temperatures.
The development has prompted the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to issue an alert, urging Operation Warp Speed (OWS) organizations and companies involved in vaccine storage and transport to review the indicators of compromise (IoCs) and beef up their defenses.
It is unclear whether any of the phishing attempts were successful, but the company said it has notified appropriate entities and authorities about this targeted attack.
The phishing emails, dating to September, targeted organizations in Italy, Germany, South Korea, the Czech Republic, greater Europe, and Taiwan, including the European Commission's Directorate-General for Taxation and Customs Union, unnamed solar panel manufacturers, a South Korean software development firm, and a German website development company.
IBM said the attacks likely targeted organizations linked to the Gavi vaccine alliance with the goal of harvesting user credentials to gain future unauthorized access to corporate networks and sensitive information relating to the COVID-19 vaccine distribution.
To lend the emails an air of credibility, the operators behind the operation crafted lures that masqueraded as requests for quotations for participation in a vaccine program. The attackers also impersonated a business executive from Haier Biomedical, a legitimate China-based cold chain provider, in an attempt to convince the recipients to open the inbound emails without questioning the sender's authenticity.
"The emails contain malicious HTML attachments that open locally, prompting recipients to enter their credentials to view the file," IBM researchers Claire Zaboeva and Melissa Frydrych said.
Although the researchers could not establish the identities of the threat actor, the ultimate objective, it appears, is to harvest the usernames and passwords and abuse them to steal intellectual property and move laterally across the victim environments for subsequent espionage campaigns.
COVID-19 Vaccine Research Emerges a Lucrative Target
COVID-19 vaccine research and development has been a target of sustained cyberattacks since the start of the year.
Back in June, IBM disclosed details of a similar phishing campaign targeting a German entity connected with procuring personal protective equipment (PPE) from China-based supply and purchasing chains.
The cyberassaults led the US Department of Justice to charge two Chinese nationals for stealing sensitive data, including from companies developing COVID-19 vaccines, testing technology, and treatments, while operating both for private financial gain and on behalf of China's Ministry of State Security.
In November, Microsoft said it detected cyberattacks from three nation-state agents in Russia (Fancy Bear aka Strontium) and North Korea (Hidden Cobra and Cerium) directed against pharmaceutical companies located in Canada, France, India, South Korea, and the US that are involved in COVID-19 vaccines in various stages of clinical trials.
Then last week, it emerged that suspected North Korean hackers have targeted British drugmaker AstraZeneca by posing as recruiters on networking site LinkedIn and WhatsApp to approach its employees with fake job offers and tricking them into opening what were purported to be job description documents to gain access to their systems and install malware.
| Cyber_Attack |
U.S. Supreme Court allows the FBI to Hack any Computer in the World | https://thehackernews.com/2016/04/fbi-hacking-power.html | In Brief
The US Supreme Court has approved amendments to Rule 41, which now gives judges the authority to issue search warrants, not only for computers located in their jurisdiction but also outside their jurisdiction.
Under the original Rule 41, let's say, a New York judge can only authorize the FBI to hack into a suspect's computer in New York.
But the amended rule would now make it easier for the FBI to hack into any computer or network, literally anywhere in the world.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) can now Hack your computers anywhere, anytime.
The FBI appeared to have been granted powers to hack any computer legally across the country, and perhaps anywhere in the world, with just a single search warrant authorized by any United States judge.
The U.S. Supreme Court approved yesterday a change in Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure that would let U.S. judges issue warrants for remote access to electronic devices outside their jurisdiction.
"These amendments will have significant consequences for Americans' privacy and the scope of the government's powers to conduct remote surveillance and searches of electronic devices," Democratic Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon said in a statement Thursday.
"Under the proposed rules, the government would now be able to obtain a single warrant to access and search thousands or millions of computers at once; and the vast majority of the affected computers would belong to the victims, not the perpetrators, of cybercrime."
If Congress doesn't act, the changes to the Rule 41 will take immediate effect in December despite opposition from technology giants and civil liberties groups who believes the changes would expand the FBI's power to conduct mass hacks on computer networks.
The tech giants and civil liberties groups like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) say the change also could run afoul of the American Constitution's protections against inappropriate searches and seizures.
However, while proposing the rule change in 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice described it as a small modification required to modernize the criminal code for the digital age, saying the changes wouldn't permit searches that aren't already legal.
The FBI Now Can Legally Hack TOR Users
Previously, under the Rule 41, magistrate judges could not approve search warrants to remotely hack or access computers outside their jurisdiction.
But with the rule change, magistrate judges could now issue orders to search or seize computers and electronic devices outside their local authority if the target's location is unknown or if the target is using anonymity software like TOR.
More than a Million of Internet users make use of TOR anonymity software to browse the Web just to hide their actual identity for entirely legitimate reasons, in addition to criminals who use TOR to hide their locations.
Recently, the court threw out evidence that the FBI brought by hacking the members of the child pornography site PlayPen on the TOR network using its so-called Network Investigative Technique (NIT), explaining the feds violated Rule 41's territorial restrictions.
This rule change would prevent something like that from happening, opening doors for the FBI to legally hack any computer in any country.
The Congress has time until 1 December 2016 to reject changes or make more changes to Rule 41, after which the amended version of the rule will take effect.
| Malware |
Popular Photo Sharing Website Likes.com Vulnerable To Multiple Critical Flaws | https://thehackernews.com/2014/09/popular-photo-sharing-website.html | Likes.com, one of the emerging social networking site and popular image browsing platform, is found vulnerable to several critical vulnerabilities that could allow an attacker to completely delete users' account in just one click.
Likes.com is a social networking website that helps you to connect with people you like and make new friends for free. Just like any other social place, users can always follow their favorite tag or people who catch their fancy. It is much easier to use and is designed for those who want to look at pictures different people upload.
An independent security researcher Mohamed M. Fouad from Egypt has found a series of critical security vulnerabilities in the Likes website that really pose danger to its users. The vulnerabilities he found not only have capability to add any post, comment to users' account as well as delete users' account, but the vulnerabilities can be escalated to deface entire website by posting malicious URLs and delete all users accounts.
CRITICAL VULNERABILITIES IN LIKES.COM
Fouad discovered that the Likes.com website is vulnerable to three security vulnerabilities:
Login-brute force
Login bypass
CSRF - Cross-Site Request Forgery
CSRF VULNERABILITY
Among all the three flaws, the most critical one, according to Fouad, is CSRF vulnerability, because exploiting this vulnerability can allow an attacker to force users to add malicious links to their posts and comments and if user click it, their accounts can be deleted in just a click.
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF or XSRF) is a method of attacking a Web site in which an intruder masquerades as a legitimate and trusted user. All the attacker need to do is get the target browser to make a request to your website on their behalf. If they can either:
Convince your users to click on a HTML page they've constructed
Insert arbitrary HTML in a target website that your users visit
Basically, an attacker will use CSRF to trick a victim into accessing a website or clicking a URL link that contains malicious or unauthorized requests.
JUST ONE CLICK AND USERS' ACCOUNTS DELETED
"It's so easy, I tried it but in some testing accounts. I was able to generate my malicious url in all posts by image_id (Post) then my malicious url was in thousands of posts as a comment. So any user who click it, his/her account will be deleted immediately," Fouad told The Hacker News.
Not just this, the CSRF vulnerability could be escalated by a cyber criminal to deface entire website by generating random POSTs (image_ids) and post malicious url to (DELETE USER ACCOUNTS) in order to delete a number of users account just in one click.
"Using same CSRF vulnerability, I can also force the user to post my malicious URL to his/her account, so that all his/her friends who will browse that link, their accounts will be deleted by just one click."
LOGIN BRUTE-FORCE ATTACK
Fouad discovered an account password by systematically trying every possible combination of letters, numbers and symbols until and unless he discovered the correct combination. This clearly means that the login page of the Likes.com website doesn't have any protection against password brute force attacks.
As a result, anyone can try multiple number of attempts in order to guess the correct password combination. The site must have implemented some type of account lockout after a defined number of incorrect password attempts, said Fouad in his blog post.
LOGIN BYPASS ATTACK
Fouad also found a security problem with login when anyone click on "unsubscribe" link in their email notifications. Once clicked, user is redirected to the account settings.
Now, when he tried to open this URL in different browsers and different machines, he was able to access the account normally, and that too without Login. This shows Likes accounts can bypassed your login.
As a responsible security researcher, Fouad also reported the critical flaws 10 days ago to the Likes team, but neither the company fix it, nor it replied him back. Fouad has also provided a video demonstration as a Proof of Concept. The security vulnerabilities are critical and should be fixed as soon as possible.
| Vulnerability |
Stabuniq Trojan rapidly stealing data from US banks | https://thehackernews.com/2012/12/stabuniq-trojan-rapidly-stealing-data.html | Trojan.Stabuniq geographic distribution by unique IP address
Security researchers from Symantec have identified a new Trojan that appears to be targeting financial institutions. Dubbed Trojan.Stabuniq, the malware has been collecting information from infected systems potentially for the preparation of a more damaging attack.
According to researchers, roughly 40 IP addresses infected with the Stabuniq Trojan, 40% per cent belong to financial institutions who are mostly based in Chicago and New York.
The malware appears to be spread by a phishing attack through spam e-mail containing a link to the address of a server hosting a Web exploit toolkit. Such toolkits are commonly used to silently install malware on Web users' computers by exploiting vulnerabilities in outdated browser plug-ins like Flash Player, Adobe Reader, or Java.
These attacks can be very simple, such as a written email from a prince in Nigeria asking for bank account information.
Once installed, it collects information including its computer name, IP address, operating system version and installed service packs, running processes and dumps that data to a command & control server located at:
anatwriteromist.com
bbcnews192.com
belsaw920.com
benhomelandefit.com
midfielderguin.com
prominentpirsa.com
sovereutilizeignty.com
yolanda911.com
Recommended actions for readers, Use a firewall to block all incoming connections from the Internet to services that should not be publicly available. By default, you should deny all incoming connections and only allow services you explicitly want to offer to the outside world.
Ensure that programs and users of the computer use the lowest level of privileges necessary to complete a task. When prompted for a root or UAC password, ensure that the program asking for administration-level access is a legitimate application.
Turn off and remove unnecessary services and Enforce a password policy. Stay tuned to +The Hacker News .
| Malware |
Namecheap Accounts Compromised in Data Breach | https://thehackernews.com/2014/09/namecheap-accounts-compromised-in-data_2.html | LA-based domain name registrar and hosting company Namecheap warned its customers on Monday that cybercriminals have begun accessing their accounts by using the list of credentials gathered from third-party websites.
The Hosting company confirmed the security breach and informed that the hackers have compromised some of its customers' accounts, probably using the "biggest-ever" password theft via Russian Hackers that disclosed list of 1.2 billion usernames and passwords compiled by Russian CyberVor Gang.
RUSSIAN GROUP BEHIND THE ATTACK - CYBERVOR
The CyberVor Gang allegedly stolen a vast cache of compromised login credentials for "1.2 billion" accounts, belonging to over half a billion e-mail addresses, warned Hold Security, a Milwaukee-based security company that tracks stolen data on underground cybercriminal forums.
The gang appears to have broken into at least 420,000 websites vulnerable to SQL injection attacks, among other techniques, in order to fetch majority of these credentials.
GOOD NEWS - NAMECHEAP BECOME AWARE OF THE ATTACK SOON
Namecheap said it had become aware of the ongoing attacks, thanks to the company's intrusion detection systems that alerted them to a "much higher than normal load against our login system [using] username and password data gathered from third party sites that were trying to be used to try and gain access to Namecheap.com accounts."
The invaders were trying multiple times to log in to a number of accounts until they get the right combination and access. While most of their attempts were failed but some appear to be successful, prompting Namecheap to suspend some users' accounts in the fear that it may have been compromised as well as blocking over 30,000 IP addresses associated with the attack, as detailed in on the corporate blog of the hosting firm.
FAKE BROWSER USED IN MASSIVE BREACH
It is believed that the hackers behind the attack are using the stored usernames and passwords to simulate a web browser login through fake browser software. This software replicates the actual login procedure a customer would use if they are making use of Firefox, Safari, or Chrome browsers to access their Namecheap account.
"The hackers are going through their username/password list and trying each and every one to try and get into Namecheap user accounts. The vast majority of these login attempts have been unsuccessful as the data is incorrect or old and passwords have been changed," the company said in a blog post entitled, Urgent Security Warning.
"As a precaution, we are aggressively blocking the IP addresses that appear to be logging in with the stolen password data. We are also logging these IP addresses and will be exporting blocking rules across our network to completely eliminate access to any Namecheap system or service, as well as making this data available to law enforcement."
Namecheap believed that the hacking attack is linked to the Russian CyberVor gang and is not at all related to the recent data breaches such as the high-profile Target breach or the Adobe attack.
HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF
"Our early investigation shows that those users who use the same password for their Namecheap account that are used on other websites are the ones who are vulnerable," said Matt Russell, vice president of hosting company.
Russell encourages Namecheap customers to enable two-factor authentication when they regain access to their Namecheap account. Two-factor authentication has been enabled at other web hosting companies as users look for ways to add an extra layer of security to their hosting and email accounts.
| Data_Breaches |
Dragonfly 2.0: Hacking Group Infiltrated European and US Power Facilities | https://thehackernews.com/2017/09/dragonfly-energy-hacking.html | The notorious hacking group that has been in operation since at least 2011 has re-emerged and is still interested in targeting the United States and European companies in the energy sector.
Yes, I am talking about the 'Dragonfly,' a well-resourced, Eastern European hacking group responsible for sophisticated cyber-espionage campaigns against the critical infrastructure of energy companies in different countries in past years.
In 2014, we reported about the Dragonfly groups ability to mount sabotage operations against their targets—mainly petroleum pipeline operators, electricity generation firms and other Industrial Control Systems (ICS) equipment providers for the energy sector.
Researchers from cyber security firm Symantec who discovered the previous campaign is now warning of a new campaign, which they dubbed Dragonfly 2.0, saying "the group now potentially has the ability to sabotage or gain control of these systems should it decide to do so" and has already gained unprecedented access to operational systems of Western energy firms.
Here are the major highlights of the group activities outlined in the new report from Symantec:
The hacking group has been active since late 2015 and reportedly using same tactics and tools that were used in earlier campaigns.
The major objective of the Dragonfly 2.0 group is to collect intelligence and gain access to the networks of the targeted organization, eventually making the group capable of mounting sabotage operations when required.
Dragonfly 2.0 majorly targeting the critical energy sectors in the U.S., Turkey, and Switzerland.
Like previous Dragonfly campaigns, the hackers are using malicious email (containing very specific content related to the energy sector) attachments, watering hole attacks, and Trojanized software as an initial attack vector to gain access to a victim's network.
The group is using a toolkit called Phishery (available on GitHub) to perform email-based attacks that host template injection attack to steal victim's credentials.
Malware campaign involves multiple remote access Trojans masquerading as Flash updates called, Backdoor.Goodor, Backdoor.Dorshel and Trojan.Karagany.B, allowing attackers to provide remote access to the victim's machine.
However, Symantec researchers did not find any evidence of the Dragonfly 2.0 group using any zero day vulnerabilities. Instead, the hacking group strategically uses publically available administration tools like PowerShell, PsExec, and Bitsadmin, making attribution more difficult.
"The Dragonfly 2.0 campaigns show how the attackers may be entering into a new phase, with recent campaigns potentially providing them with access to operational systems, access that could be used for more disruptive purposes in future," Symantec believes.
Cyber attacks on energy grids are not a new thing. Energy companies in Ukraine targeted by hackers on two different occasions in late 2015 and late 2016, actually caused the power outage across several regions in Ukraine, causing a blackout for tens of thousands of citizens around midnight.
Moreover, Nuclear facilities in the United States, including Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corporation, were targeted by a well-known Russian group back in July this year, but luckily there's no proof if the hackers were able to gain access to the operational systems or not.
| Cyber_Attack |
Hackers Turning to 'Exotic' Programming Languages for Malware Development | https://thehackernews.com/2021/07/hackers-turning-to-exotic-programming.html | Threat actors are increasingly shifting to "exotic" programming languages such as Go, Rust, Nim, and Dlang that can better circumvent conventional security protections, evade analysis, and hamper reverse engineering efforts.
"Malware authors are known for their ability to adapt and modify their skills and behaviors to take advantage of newer technologies," said Eric Milam, Vice President of threat research at BlackBerry. "That tactic has multiple benefits from the development cycle and inherent lack of coverage from protective products."
On the one hand, languages like Rust are more secure as they offer guarantees like memory-safe programming, but they can also be a double-edged sword when malware engineers abuse the same features designed to offer increased safeguards to their advantage, thereby making malware less susceptible to exploitation and thwart attempts to activate a kill-switch and render them powerless.
Noting that binaries written in these languages can appear more complex, convoluted, and tedious when disassembled, the researchers said the pivot adds additional layers of obfuscation, simply by virtue of them being relatively new, leading to a scenario where older malware developed using traditional languages like C++ and C# are being actively retooled with droppers and loaders written in uncommon alternatives to evade detection by endpoint security systems.
Earlier this year, enterprise security firm Proofpoint discovered new malware written in Nim (NimzaLoader) and Rust (RustyBuer) that it said were being used in active campaigns to distribute and deploy Cobalt Strike and ransomware strains via social engineering campaigns. In a similar vein, CrowdStrike last month observed a ransomware sample that borrowed implementations from previous HelloKitty and FiveHands variants, while using a Golang packer to encrypt its main C++-based payload.
BlackBerry's latest findings show that these artifacts are part of an uptick in threat actors adopting Dlang, Go, Nim, and Rust to rewrite existing families or create tools for new malware sets over the past decade -
Dlang - DShell, Vovalex, OutCrypt, RemcosRAT
Go - ElectroRAT, EKANS (aka Snake), Zebrocy, WellMess, ChaChi
Nim - NimzaLoader, Zebrocy, DeroHE, Nim-based Cobalt Strike loaders
Rust - Convuster Adware, RustyBuer, TeleBots Downloader and Backdoor, NanoCore Dropper, PyOxidizer
"Programs written using the same malicious techniques but in a new language are not usually detected at the same rate as those written in a more mature language," BlackBerry researchers concluded.
"The loaders, droppers and wrappers [...] are in many cases simply altering the first stage of the infection process rather than changing the core components of the campaign. This is the latest in threat actors moving the line just outside of the range of security software in a way that might not trigger on later stages of the original campaign."
| Malware |
PayPal Subsidiary Data Breach Hits Up to 1.6 Million Customers | https://thehackernews.com/2017/12/paypal-tio-data-breach.html | Global e-commerce business PayPal has disclosed a data breach that may have compromised personally identifiable information for roughly 1.6 million customers at a payment processing company PayPal acquired earlier this year.
PayPal Holdings Inc. said Friday that a review of its recently acquired company TIO Networks showed evidence of unauthorized access to the company's network, including some confidential parts where the personal information of TIO's customers and customers of TIO billers stored.
Acquired by PayPal for US$233 Million in July 2017, TIO Network is a cloud-based multi-channel bill payment processor and receivables management provider that serves the largest telecom, wireless, cable and utility bill issuers in North America.
PayPal did not clear when or how the data breach incident took place, neither it revealed details about the types of information being stolen by the hackers, but the company did confirm that its platform and systems were not affected by the incident.
"The PayPal platform is not impacted in any way, as the TIO systems are completely separate from the PayPal network, and PayPal's customers' data remains secure," PayPal said in its press release [PDF].
The data breach in TIO Networks was discovered as part of an ongoing investigation for identifying security vulnerabilities in the payment processing platform.
As soon as PayPal identified an unauthorized access to the TIO's network, PayPal took action by "initiating an internal investigation of TIO and bringing in additional third-party cybersecurity expertise to review TIO's bill payment platform," PayPal press release [PDF] reads.
The company has begun working with companies it services to notify potentially affected customers.
Besides notifying, the company is also working with a consumer credit reporting agency, Experian, to provide free credit monitoring memberships for fraud and identity theft to those who are affected by the breach.
To protect its customers, TIO has also suspended its services until a full-scale investigation into the incident is completed.
"At this point, TIO cannot provide a timeline for restoring bill pay services, and continues to recommend that you contact your biller to identify alternative ways to pay your bills," TIO's Consumer FAQ reads.
"We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused to you by the disruption of TIO's service."
Since the investigation is ongoing, PayPal will communicate with TIO customers and merchant partners directly as soon as the company has more details on the incident. Also, the affected customers will be directly contacted by the company.
| Data_Breaches |
Carberp botnet developers team arrested in Russia | https://thehackernews.com/2013/04/carberp-botnet-developers-team-arrested.html | Cybercriminals, underground hacking communities, hacker's market and Exploit packs.... Russian cyberspace is well known for such crazy hacking stuff. Recently, the original Carberp botnet developer ring that stole millions from bank accounts worldwide has been arrested.
According to a report from Russian newspaper, a group of 20 people who served as its malware development team, were arrested by the Sluzhba Bezpeky Ukrayiny and the Federalnaya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federatsii (federal security service of Russia, FSB) in cities around Ukraine.
Over $250 million has been stolen by the members of the botnet ring, which had roughly 20 members aged between 25 and 30. "Our experts did an enormous amount of work, which resulted in identifying the head of this criminal group, the owner and operator of a specialized banking botnet, identifying the control servers, and identifying the directing of traffic from popular websites in order to spread malware infection," said Ilya Sachkov, chief executive of Group-IB,
As recently as December, Carpberp fetched $40,000 per kit. Carberp malware was used as part of the "Eurograbber" botnet system uncovered late last year that went after both PCs and smartphones in its financial fraud campaign.
Like other banking Trojans, Carberp could intercept information which could be used to break into online banking accounts and transfer funds. Its mobile component allows criminals to steal mobile transaction authentication numbers (mTANs) sent by banks to authorize specific transactions.
Each of them worked remotely, and were responsible for the development of one part of the malware, officials said. Carberp was constantly modified and updated to ensure it would evade antivirus detection. If found guilty, under current law, they could face up to five years in prison.
| Malware |
Shamoon Malware : Permanently wiping data from Energy Industry Computers | https://thehackernews.com/2012/08/shamoon-malware-permanently-wiping-data.html | Malware researchers have uncovered an attack targeting an organization in the energy industry that attempts to wreak havoc by permanently wiping data from an infected computer's hard drive and rendering the machine unusable. Symantec would not name the victimized firm, and so far has seen the attack only in this one organization.
W32.Disttrack is a new threat that is being used in specific targeted attacks against at least one organization in the energy sector. It is a destructive malware that corrupts files on a compromised computer and overwrites the MBR (Master Boot Record) in an effort to render a computer unusable.
W32.Disttrack consists of several components:
Dropper—the main component and source of the original infection. It drops a number of other modules.
Wiper—this module is responsible for the destructive functionality of the threat.
Reporter—this module is responsible for reporting infection information back to the attacker.
"Ten years ago we used to see purely malicious threats like this," muses Symantec researcher Liam O Murchu. The likely scenario for the victim would be an experience in which the computer is booting up, but all the files get erased, and the computer collapses into a non-bootable state.
Saudi Arabia-based Saudi Aramco, the world's largest crude exporter, was reportedly hit by a computer virus this week that entered its network through personal computers. Shamoon is unusual because it goes to great lengths to ensure destroyed data can never be recovered, something that is rarely seen in targeted attacks. It has self-propagation capabilities that allow it to spread from computer to computer using shared network disks. It overwrites disks with a small portion of a JPEG image found on the Internet.
| Malware |
Sensitive server info leaked from weather.gov Vulnerability | https://thehackernews.com/2012/10/sensitive-server-info-leaked-from.html | Kosova Hacker's Security group today release very sensitive server info of "The National Weather Service", which was gathered due to a "Local file inclusion" Vulnerability in weather.gov .
By definition, Local File Inclusion (also known as LFI) is the process of including files on a server through the web browser. This vulnerability occurs when a page include is not properly sanitized, and allows directory traversal characters to be injected.
Hackers publish complete data in a pastebin file uploaded today, but the hack was performed two day back and in meantime, server administrator fix the vulnerability.
We just talk with the hacking crew to know the reason of hack and data exposure, one of them explain that they are against US policies, who are targeting muslim countries. "They hack our nuclear plants using STUXNET and FLAME like malwares , they are bombing us 24*7, we can't sit silent - hack to payback them"
Hacker expose data from sensitive files :
/etc/passwd
/etc/groups
/etc/hosts
/etc/samba/dhcp.conf
/etc/apache2/conf.d
/proc/version
/proc/cpuinfo
/proc/self/mounts
/proc/self/status
/proc/self/stat
/etc/security/access.conf
/etc/ldap/ldap.conf
/etc/cups/printers.conf
/etc/gconf
/etc/syslog.conf
/etc/snmp/snmpd.conf
/share/snmp/snmpd.conf
/etc/ca-certificates.conf
/etc/mysql/conf.d
/etc/security/limits.conf
/etc/security/group.conf
For a server administrator this information is very sensitive, whereas for a Hacker this information could be too much juicy like members of /bin/bash shell are root, cmccan, darnold, mstrydom, nscanner who can login via console. That means, hackers can try to brute force there usernames against password list to compromise whole server.
In their note hackers wrote, "Months ago in the American media write that as Americans have in the field control cybernetics Muslim country servers. We as an organization have taken the order we receive checks in some American servers as it is one of to Weather.Gov. We do not want Americans to take control servers Muslim country .We have infected computers with botnets very few organizations that deal with anti-Muslim purposes. We will soon publish the many other things the U.S. government and we will never stop year after year . This is our mission ."
UPDATE: A 'The Hacker News' Reader - Chirag Singh just reported another vulnerability in same site. This time its Cross site scripting, Proof of concept is as shown below in screenshot.
| Vulnerability |
This July Microsoft Plans to Patch Windows and Internet Explorer Vulnerabilities | https://thehackernews.com/2014/07/this-july-microsoft-plans-to-patch.html | Beginning of the new month, Get Ready for Microsoft Patch Tuesday!
Microsoft has released its Advance Notification for the month of July 2014 Patch Tuesday releasing six security Bulletins, which will address a total of six vulnerabilities in its products, out of which two are marked critical, one is rated moderate and rest are important in severity.
All six vulnerabilities are important for you to patch, as the flaws are affecting various Microsoft software, including Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Server Software and Internet Explorer, with the critical ones targeting Internet Explorer and Windows. Microsoft is also providing an update for the "Microsoft Service Bus for Windows Server" which is rated moderate for a Denial of Service (DoS) flaw.
"At first glance it looks like Microsoft may be taking it easy on us this month, which would be nice since we will be coming off a long holiday weekend here in the U.S." Chris Goettl from IT Security firm Shavlik told in an email to The Hacker News. "Microsoft has announced six bulletins for July: two critical, three important and one moderate. The critical updates could allow for remote code execution, which would prevent attackers from accessing your data remotely. The important updates are all elevation of privilege attacks and the moderate is a denial-of-service attack update."
ONCE AGAIN, INTERNET EXPLORER
As usually, one of the two Critical security bulletins is related to Internet Explorer, which will address a Remote Code Execution vulnerability, affecting all versions of Internet Explorer including IE11 in Windows 8.1.
The second Critical security bulletin impacts almost every supported version of the Windows operating system, including Windows 8.1. Windows RT, Server 2008 and server 2012 R2 all have critical fixes that may require a restarting.
Bulletin 3, 4, and 5 are all elevation of privilege vulnerabilities in Windows and affect all versions of Windows, and therefore, are important to patch.
The final bulletin is rated 'moderate' and is a Denial of Service vulnerability, which impacts Microsoft Service Bus for Windows Server.
"This month we are primarily looking at OS updates, although there is also an Internet Explorer update. Considering last month there was a cumulative security update for IE that affects all currently supported versions of IE on all currently supported versions of Windows, this month there will likely not be a cumulative update." Chris Goettl said.
PATCH TUESDAY, 8TH JULY
Full details of the vulnerabilities will be released on Tuesday, July 8 at 10am PST by Microsoft, along with a guide for administrators.
'One thing to watch out for will be the many exceptions we saw last month. Many of the updates we saw in June require other updates to be in place, depending on the platform it applied to. For those running Windows 8.1 or Server 2012 R2, they need to be prepared for more of these updates to require Update 1 before they can apply them. Microsoft had stated they would delay a hard enforcement until August, but more and more of the patches had variations that required Update 1', Chris said.
Microsoft will not release any security update for its older version of Windows XP, as it stopped supporting Windows XP Operating System. So, if you are still running this older version of operating system on your PCs, we again advise you to move on to other operating system in order to receive updates and secure yourself from upcoming threats.
| Vulnerability |
Experts Shed Light On Distinctive Tactics Used by Hades Ransomware | https://thehackernews.com/2021/06/experts-shed-light-on-distinctive.html | Cybersecurity researchers on Tuesday disclosed "distinctive" tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) adopted by operators of Hades ransomware that set it apart from the rest of the pack, attributing it to a financially motivated threat group called GOLD WINTER.
"In many ways, the GOLD WINTER threat group is a typical post-intrusion ransomware threat group that pursues high-value targets to maximize how much money it can extort from its victims," researchers from SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) said in an analysis shared with The Hacker News. "However, GOLD WINTER's operations have quirks that distinguish it from other groups."
The findings come from a study of incident response efforts the Atlanta-based cybersecurity firm engaged in the first quarter of 2021.
Since first emerging in the threat landscape in December 2020, Hades has been classified as INDRIK SPIDER's successor to WastedLocker ransomware with "additional code obfuscation and minor feature changes," per Crowdstrike. INDRIK SPIDER, also known as GOLD DRAKE and Evil Corp, is a sophisticated eCrime group infamous for operating a banking trojan called Dridex as well as distributing BitPaymer ransomware between 2017 and 2020.
The WastedLocker-derived ransomware strain has been found to have impacted at least three victims as of late March 2021, according to research by Accenture's Cyber Investigation and Forensic Response (CIFR) and Cyber Threat Intelligence (ACTI) teams, including a U.S. transportation and logistics organization, a U.S. consumer products organization, and a global manufacturing organization. Trucking giant Forward Air was revealed to be a target back in December 2020.
Then a subsequent analysis published by Awake Security raised the possibility that an advanced threat actor may be operating under the guise of Hades, citing a Hafnium domain that was identified as an indicator of compromise within the timeline of the Hades attack. Hafnium is the name assigned by Microsoft to a Chinese nation-state actor that the company has said is behind the ProxyLogon attacks on vulnerable Exchange Servers earlier this year.
Stating that the threat group uses TTPs not associated with other ransomware operators, Secureworks said the absence of Hades from underground forums and marketplaces could mean that Hades is operated as private ransomware rather than ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS).
GOLD WINTER targets virtual private networks and remote desktop protocols to gain an initial foothold and maintain access to victim environments, using it to achieve persistence via tools such as Cobalt Strike. In one instance, the adversary disguised the Cobalt Strike executable as a CorelDRAW graphics editor application to mask the true nature of the file, the researchers said.
In a second case, Hades was found to leverage SocGholish malware — usually associated with the GOLD DRAKE group — as an initial access vector. SocGholish refers to a drive-by attack in which a user is tricked into visiting an infected website using social engineering themes that impersonate browser updates to trigger a malicious download without user intervention.
Interestingly, in what appears to be an attempt to mislead attribution or "pay homage to admired ransomware families," Hades has exhibited a pattern of duplicating ransom notes from other rival groups like REvil and Conti.
Another novel technique involves the use of Tox instant messaging service for communications, not to mention the use of Tor-based websites tailored to each victim as opposed to utilizing a centralized leak site to expose data stolen from its victims. "Each website includes a victim-specific Tox chat ID for communications," the researchers said.
"Ransomware groups are typically opportunistic: they target any organization that could be susceptible to extortion and will likely pay the ransom," the researchers noted. "However, GOLD WINTER's attacks on large North America-based manufacturers indicates that the group is a 'big game hunter' that specifically seeks high-value targets."
| Malware |
Cybercriminals Using Telegram Messenger to Control ToxicEye Malware | https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/cybercriminals-using-telegram-messenger.html | Adversaries are increasingly abusing Telegram as a "command-and-control" system to distribute malware into organizations that could then be used to capture sensitive information from targeted systems.
"Even when Telegram is not installed or being used, the system allows hackers to send malicious commands and operations remotely via the instant messaging app," said researchers from cybersecurity firm Check Point, who have identified no fewer than 130 attacks over the past three months that make use of a new multi-functional remote access trojan (RAT) called "ToxicEye."
The use of Telegram for facilitating malicious activities is not new. In September 2019, an information stealer dubbed Masad Stealer was found to plunder information and cryptocurrency wallet data from infected computers using Telegram as an exfiltration channel. Then last year, Magecart groups embraced the same tactic to send stolen payment details from compromised websites back to the attackers.
The strategy also pays off in a number of ways. For a start, Telegram is not only not blocked by enterprise antivirus engines, the messaging app also allows attackers to remain anonymous, given the registration process requires only a mobile number, thereby giving them access to infected devices from virtually any location across the world.
The latest campaign spotted by Check Point is no different. Spread via phishing emails embedded with a malicious Windows executable file, ToxicEye uses Telegram to communicate with the command-and-control (C2) server and upload data to it. The malware also sports a range of exploits that allows it to steal data, transfer and delete files, terminate processes, deploy a keylogger, hijack the computer's microphone and camera to record audio and video, and even encrypt files for a ransom.
Specifically, the attack chain commences with the creation of a Telegram bot by the attacker, which is then embedded into the RAT's configuration file, before compiling it into an executable (e.g. "paypal checker by saint.exe"). This .EXE file is then injected into a decoy Word document ("solution.doc") that, when opened, downloads and runs the Telegram RAT ("C:\Users\ToxicEye\rat.exe").
"We have discovered a growing trend where malware authors are using the Telegram platform as an out-of-the-box command-and-control system for malware distribution into organizations," Check Point R&D Group Manager Idan Sharabi said. "We believe attackers are leveraging the fact that Telegram is used and allowed in almost all organizations, utilizing this system to perform cyber attacks, which can bypass security restrictions."
| Malware |
Firmware vulnerability allows man-in-the-middle attack using SD Memory cards | https://thehackernews.com/2014/01/firmware-vulnerability-allows-man-in.html | How is it possible to exploit SD Card, USB stick and other mobile devices for hacking? Another interesting hack was presented at the Chaos Computer Congress (30C3), in Hamburg, Germany.
The researchers demonstrated how it is possible to hack the microcontroller inside every SD and MicroSD flash cards that allow arbitrary code execution and can be used to perform a man in the middle attack.
The Hardware Hackers Andrew "bunnie" Huang and Sean "xobs" described the exploitation method on their blog post,"it also enables the possibility for hardware enthusiasts to gain access to a very cheap and ubiquitous source of microcontrollers."
It seems that to reduce SD cards price and increase their storage capability, engineers have to consider a form of internal entropy that could affect data integrity on every Flash drive. Almost every NAND flash memory is affected by defects and presents problems like electron leakage between adjacent cells.
"Flash memory is really cheap. So cheap, in fact, that it's too good to be true. In reality, all flash memory is riddled with defects — without exception. The illusion of a contiguous, reliable storage media is crafted through sophisticated error correction and bad block management functions. This is the result of a constant arms race between the engineers and mother nature; with every fabrication process shrinks, memory becomes cheaper but more unreliable. Likewise, with every generation, the engineers come up with more sophisticated and complicated algorithms to compensate for mother nature's propensity for entropy and randomness at the atomic scale." wrote Huang.
Manufacturers have a sophisticated software that can detect hardware issues, such as bad sectors, and correct them through firmware. Hackers could hack into these flash-based storage devices using firmware vulnerability, allowing them to install malware.
The firmware on the SD cards can be updated, but according the Huang revelations most manufacturers leave this update functionality unsecured.
During the presentation, they reverse-engineered the instruction set of a particular microcontroller to inspect firmware loading mechanism.
The attackers suitably modifying the firmware could hack any device that uses the compromised SD card (e.g. A mobile device, Wi-Fi equipped camera), the flash memory will appear to be operating normally while hacking the hoisting equipment.
The SD card could make a copy of the contents in a hidden memory area or it could run malicious code while idle avoiding detection mechanisms.
When we speak about USB hacking or SD Card is hacking we must consider that we are approaching the hacking on a large-scale due the wide diffusion of these components. Microcontrollers cost as little as 15¢ each in quantity, they are everywhere and every device that use them could be hacked.
Another consideration that must be done is that Governments and high profile hackers could be very interested in this type of attack for both cyber espionage and sabotage, arrange a countermeasure against those types of threat it is very hard.
A curiosity for the "hackers inside"... These cards could be reprogrammed to become Arduino open source microcontroller and memory systems.
"An Arduino, with its 8-bit 16 MHz microcontroller, will set you back around $20. A MicroSD card with several gigabytes of memory and a microcontroller with several times the performance could be purchased for a fraction of the price," he writes.
So, in short, destroy your SD cards if you have any dirty info on them and keep your eyes peeled for ultra-small, ultra-fast Arduino hacks.
Look closely at the presentation... and distrustful of SD cards from now on.
| Malware |
FinFisher spyware found running on computers all over the world | https://thehackernews.com/2012/08/finfisher-spyware-found-running-on.html | FinFisher, a software application used by law enforcement agencies for surveillance, appears to be far more widespred than originally thought.Sold by British company Gamma Internationl Gmbh, FinFisher secretly monitors computers by turning on webcams, recording everything the user types with a keylogger, and monitoring Skype calls.
It can also bypass popular antivirus products, communicate covertly with remote servers, record emails, chats, and VOIP calls, and harvesting data from the hard drive.
On Wednesday, computer security company Rapid7 researcher Claudio Guarnieri shared new details of the workings of FinFisher, a piece of malware sold by UK contractor Gamma Group to government agencies. He found FinFisher servers at work in Australia, Czech Republic, United Arab Emirates, Ethiopia, Estonia, Indonesia, Latvia, Mongolia, Qatar, and the United States.
Rapid7 has published the IP addresses and communication "fingerprint" of the command and control servers it has discovered. The information can be used in intrusion detection systems. "If you can identify those networks actually communicating with those IPs, it most likely means some of the people on those networks are being spied on in some way," Guarnieri said.
Muench, who is based in Munich, has said his company didn't sell FinFisher spyware to Bahrain. He said he's investigating whether the samples used against Bahraini activists were stolen demonstration copies or were sold via a third party.
| Vulnerability |
Microsoft patches Stuxnet and FREAK Vulnerabilities | https://thehackernews.com/2015/03/stuxnet-freak-windows-vulnerability.html | Microsoft has come up with its most important Patch Tuesday for this year, addressing the recently disclosed critical the FREAK encryption-downgrade attack, and a separate five-year-old vulnerability leveraged by infamous Stuxnet malware to infect Windows operating system.
Stuxnet malware, a sophisticated cyber-espionage malware allegedly developed by the US Intelligence and Israeli government together, was specially designed to sabotage the Iranian nuclear facilities a few years ago. First uncovered in 2010, Stuxnet targeted computers by exploiting vulnerabilities in Windows systems.
Thankfully, Microsoft has issued a patch to protect its Windows machines that have been left vulnerable to Stuxnet and other similar attacks for the past five years. The fixes are included in MS15-020 which resolves Stuxnet issue.
The company has also issued an update that patches the FREAK encryption vulnerability in its SSL/TSL implementation called Secure Channel (Schannel). The fixes for the vulnerability are included in MS15-031.
As we have mentioned in our previous report, FREAK — short for Factoring attack on RSA-EXPORT Keys — was initially thought to be associated with Apple's Safari and Android's stock browsers, but it was found to affect Windows PCs as well.
This decades-old FREAK vulnerability allows an attacker on your network to force the software using Schannel component such as Internet Explorer to use weak encryption over the web, so that they can easily decrypt the intercepted HTTPS connections.
Among these two critical issues, the company has also released a bunch of other updates. Microsoft's March 2015 Patch Tuesday update bundles a total of 14 security-related updates for 43 vulnerabilities affecting Internet Explorer, VBscript, Text Services, Adobe Font Drivers, and Office.
MS15-018 - A Cumulative Security Update, rated as 'critical', affects all supported versions of Internet Explorer and addresses a number of Memory Corruption vulnerabilities, two elevation of privilege vulnerabilities, and a VBscript memory corruption vulnerability.
MS15-019 - This update addresses a scripting vulnerability in some older versions of Windows operating systems. The vulnerability doesn't affect Windows 7 and later desktop versions.
MS15-021 - It addresses eight vulnerabilities in the Adobe Font Driver components for Windows and Windows Server exploitable through a malicious website or file. It is also rated 'critical' due to the possibility of remote code execution.
MS15-022 - This update fixes three unknown flaws in Office document formats as well as multiple cross-site scripting (XSS) issues for SharePoint Server, and applies to all supported versions of Microsoft Office, as well as the server-based Office Web Apps and SharePoint Server products.
MS15-023 - This bulletin, rated as 'important', addresses four vulnerabilities in the Windows Kernel-Mode driver allowing elevation of privilege and information disclosure attacks by launching a specially-crafted application.
Rest of all, MS15-024, MS15-025, MS15-027, MS15-028, MS15-29 and MS15-30, are rated as 'important' and affected Windows and Windows Server. Microsoft is advising all its users and administrators to install the new updates as soon as possible.
| Vulnerability |
More than 1,400 Financial institutions in 88 Countries targeted by Banking Trojan in 2013 | https://thehackernews.com/2013/12/more-than-1400-financial-institutions.html | As the year draws to a close, we have seen the number of emerging threats like advance phishing attacks from the Syrian Electronic Army, financial malware and exploit kits, Cryptolocker ransomware infections, massive Bitcoin theft, extensive privacy breach from NSA and many more.
The financial malware's were the most popular threat this year. Money is always a perfect motivation for attackers and cyber criminals who are continually targeting financial institutions.
On Tuesday, Antivirus firm Symantec has released a Threat report, called "The State of Financial Trojans: 2013", which revealed that over 1,400 financial institutions have been targeted and compromised millions of computers around the globe and the most targeted banks are in the US with 71.5% of all analyzed Trojans.
Financial institutions have been fighting against malware for the last ten years to protect their customers and online transactions from threat. Over the time the attackers adapted to these countermeasures and sophisticated banking Trojans began to emerge.
According to the report, the number of infections of the most common financial Trojans grew to 337 percent in the first nine months of 2013. Nearly 1,500 institutions in 88 countries were potential targets during 2013.
The financial fraud marketplace is also increasingly organized and Cyber criminals are using advanced Trojans to commit large scale attacks.
Attackers of all skill levels can enter the arena of financial fraud, as the underground marketplace is a service industry that provides an abundance of resources. Those who lack expertise can simply purchase what they need. For as little as $100, an attacker can avail of a leaked Zeus or Spyeye equipped with Web-injects.
The modern financial Trojan is extremely flexible, supporting a range of functionality designed to facilitate fraudulent transactions across a variety of services.
Two dominant attack strategies are:
Focused attack: This approach suits attackers with limited resources but also scales well to larger operations. If the distribution is accurate and the target institution has a sizeable client base, a focused attack can provide an adequate supply of targets. Shylock, Bebloh and Tilon all use this approach exclusively.
Broad strokes: In this attack strategy, Trojans are set to target large numbers of institutions. Tilon, Cridex, and Gameover adopt these tactics and Zeus also uses this approach in its default configuration.
According to Symantec, the main reason for the surge is weak authentication practices:
Unfortunately, in many situations, security implementations adopted by financial institutions are inadequate to defend against the modern financial Trojan. Institutions are starting to adopt strong security measures like chipTAN, but the adoption rate is slow. Institutions that persist with weaker security measures will continue to be exploited by attackers.
They need to maintain constant vigilance, apply software updates, maintain an awareness of new threats and deploy complementary security solutions that can defend against evolving malware attacks.
| Malware |
New Java Exploits boosts BlackHole exploit kit | https://thehackernews.com/2012/04/new-java-exploits-boosts-blackhole.html | New Java Exploits boosts BlackHole exploit kit
A widely disseminated exploit kit popular with hackers has been updated to take advantage of a recently discovered Java vulnerability. Researchers at Microsoft reported last week that it had observed this vulnerability being exploited in the wild. The Java exploit allows attackers to bypass the Java Runtime Environment's sandbox platform to install malicious code remotely.
The malicious Java applet is loaded from an obfuscated HTML file. The Java applet contains two Java class files one Java class file triggers the vulnerability and the other one is a loader class used for loading.
Named CVE-20120-0507, the flaw essentially allows hackers to bypass the Java sandbox, which is a mechanism designed to blunt attacks from malicious code. For its part, the BlackHole exploit kit, available underground, allows users armed with only basic computer knowledge to set up malicious websites to target vulnerable computers through the web browser.
Statistics from vulnerability management firm Rapid7 tell a similar story based on its analysis of the Java patching habits of Internet users. According to the company, the first month after a Java patch is released the fix is deployed by less than 10 percent. After two months, the number jumps to approximately 20 percent. The highest patch rate for Java last year was 38 percent, which represented the percentage who applied the Java Version 6 Update 26 within three months of its release.
According to software giant Oracle, Java is deployed across more than 3 billion systems worldwide. But the truth is that many people who have this powerful program installed simply do not need it, or only need it for very specific uses. I've repeatedly encouraged readers to uninstall this program, not only because of the constant updating it requires, but also because there seem to be a never-ending supply of new exploits available for recently-patched or undocumented vulnerabilities in the program.
| Vulnerability |
International Organization For Migration database hacked by Inj3ct0r Team for GREEN LIBYA | https://thehackernews.com/2011/07/international-organization-for.html | International Organization For Migration database hacked by Inj3ct0r Team for GREEN LIBYA
Inj3ct0r Team Hackers hack the database of International Organization For Migration database (https://www.iom.int/) .
Statement by Hacker "Sorry about the usernames and passwords not giving because we take no responsibility of defacing their database and official website.. But we want to deliver them the message that they're still publishing lies and trying to give a bad image about what's going in libya. Rooted and exposed for the pride of GREEN LIBYA and Supporting the green libyan nation."
Data leaked By Hackers
Database :
MySQL (MM MySQL JDBC)
Database driver :
com.mysql.jdbc.Driver
Database URL :
jdbc:mysql://localhost/jahia?useUnicode=true&characterEncoding=UTF-8
2)
Database :
Orcale 9.x - 10.x
Database driver :
oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleDriver
Database URL :
jdbc:oracle:thin:@localhost:1521:jahia
3)
Database :
PostgreSQL 7.4.x
Database driver :
org.postgresql.Driver
Database URL :
jdbc:postgresql:jahia
4)
Database :
SQL Server jTDS JDBC Drivers
Database driver :
net.sourceforge.jtds.jdbc.Driver
Database URL :
jdbc:jtds:sqlserver://localhost:1433/jahia
Proof of HACK :
| Vulnerability |
Adobe Reader zero-day vulnerability with modified Blackhole Exploit-Kit | https://thehackernews.com/2012/11/adobe-reader-zero-day-vulnerability.html | Group-IB, a Russian cybercrime investigation company has discovered a zero-day vulnerability, affects Adobe Reader X and Adobe Reader XI. The vulnerability is also included in new modified version of Blackhole Exploit-Kit, which is used for the distributing the banking Trojans (Zeus, Spyeye, Carberp, Citadel) with the help of exploitation different vulnerabilities in client-side software.
The particular exploit is available in underground forums for as much as $50,000 and bug is dangerous because it permits cybercriminals to run arbitrary shellcode by bypassing the sandbox feature integrated into the more recent versions of Adobe Reader.
For now this flaw is distributed only in only small circles of the underground but it has the potential for much larger post-exploitation methods.
The exploit is limited to Microsoft Windows installations of Adobe Reader and it can't be fully executed until the user closes his Web browser (or Reader). Adobe representatives said that they were not aware of the issue. If Group IB's discovery is confirmed and Adobe patches it, it would end the software maker's two year run on zero real attacks against the sandboxed versions of Reader.
Proof-of-concept (POC) video demonstrate on YouTube by Group-IB:
| Vulnerability |
Another Critical RCE Flaw Discovered in SolarWinds Orion Platform | https://thehackernews.com/2021/03/solarwinds-orion-vulnerability.html | IT infrastructure management provider SolarWinds on Thursday released a new update to its Orion networking monitoring tool with fixes for four security vulnerabilities, counting two weaknesses that could be exploited by an authenticated attacker to achieve remote code execution (RCE).
Chief among them is a JSON deserialization flaw that allows an authenticated user to execute arbitrary code via the test alert actions feature available in the Orion Web Console, which lets users simulate network events (e.g., an unresponsive server) that can be configured to trigger an alert during setup. It has been rated critical in severity.
A second issue concerns a high-risk vulnerability that could be leveraged by an adversary to achieve RCE in the Orion Job Scheduler. "In order to exploit this, an attacker first needs to know the credentials of an unprivileged local account on the Orion Server," SolarWinds said in its release notes.
The advisory is light on technical specifics, but the two shortcomings are said to have been reported via Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative.
Besides the aforementioned two flaws, the update squashes two other bugs, including a high-severity stored cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the "add custom tab" within customize view page (CVE-2020-35856) and a reverse tabnabbing and open redirect vulnerability in the custom menu item options page (CVE-2021-3109), both of which require an Orion administrator account for successful exploitation.
The new update also brings a number of security improvements, with fixes for preventing XSS attacks and enabling UAC protection for Orion database manager, among others.
The latest round of fixes arrives almost two months after the Texas-based company addressed two severe security vulnerabilities impacting Orion Platform (CVE-2021-25274 and CVE-2021-25275), which could have been exploited to achieve remote code execution with elevated privileges.
Orion users are recommended to update to the latest release, "Orion Platform 2020.2.5," to mitigate the risk associated with the security issues.
| Vulnerability |
Finland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs networks hit by sophisticated Malware attack | https://thehackernews.com/2013/11/Finland-Ministry-Foreign-Affairs-malware-espionage-red-october.html | Finnish commercial broadcaster MTV3 reports that the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affair networks has been targeted in a four-year-long cyber espionage operation.
Finland's foreign minister said, "I can confirm there has been a severe and large hacking in the ministry's data network,"
A large scale spying attack targeted the communications between Finland and the European Union using a malware, similar to, and more sophisticated than Red October. The breach was uncovered during the early part of this year.
MTV3 also mentioned that the breach was not discovered by the Finns themselves, but from a foreign tip-off reported to CERT.FI. Further the Finnish authorities kept the information under wraps for continuing the forensics.
There are indications that information with the lowest level security classification has been compromised, he said.
In January, 2013, we had reported about Red October Cyber-espionage operation that targeted the computer networks of various international diplomatic service agencies. According security experts from Kaspersky Lab, the cyber-espionage campaign was started since 2007 and is still active.
It is possible that Red October has been just one campaign from the same actor, and there could be others that haven't been discovered yet.
According to experts, Red October's exploits appear to have Chinese origins, whereas the malware modules may have a Russian background. So if this Finnish malware attack somewhere linked to Red October, then Russia and China are suspected of responsibility for the snooping.
Red October malware was sent via a spear-phishing email and has been tempting its targets into letting it exploit a number of relatively minor security vulnerabilities in programs such as Microsoft's Excel and Word, as well as poisoned PDFs and Java exploits.
Besides Finland, other countries could be the victim of the same attack. The Finnish Security Intelligence Service is investigating the matter.
| Malware |
Cisco Issues Security Patch Updates for 32 Flaws in its Products | https://thehackernews.com/2018/09/cisco-patch-updates.html | Cisco today released thirty security patch advisory to address a total of 32 security vulnerabilities in its products, three of which are rated critical, including the recently disclosed Apache Struts remote code execution vulnerability that is being exploited in the wild.
Out of the rest 29 vulnerabilities, fourteen are rated high and 15 medium in severity, addressing security flaws in Cisco Routers, Cisco Webex, Cisco Umbrella, Cisco SD-WAN Solution, Cisco Cloud Services Platform, Cisco Data Center Network, and more products.
The three critical security vulnerabilities patched by Cisco address issues in Apache Struts, Cisco Umbrella API, and Cisco RV110W, RV130W and RV215W router's management interface.
Apache Struts Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2018-11776)
The vulnerability, reported late last month by Semmle security researcher Man Yue Mo, resides in the core of Apache Struts and originates due to insufficient validation of user-provided untrusted inputs in the core of the Struts framework under certain configurations.
"The vulnerability exists because the affected software insufficiently validates user-supplied input, allowing the use of results with no namespace value and the use of url tags with no value or action," Cisco explains in its advisory.
"In cases where upper actions or configurations also have no namespace or a wildcard namespace, an attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a request that submits malicious input to the affected application for processing."
An unauthenticated, remote attacker can trigger the vulnerability by tricking victims to visit a specially crafted URL on the affected web server, allowing the attacker to execute malicious code and eventually take complete control over the targeted server running the vulnerable application.
All applications that use Apache Struts—supported versions (Struts 2.3 to Struts 2.3.34, and Struts 2.5 to Struts 2.5.16) and even some unsupported Apache Struts versions—are potentially vulnerable to this flaw, even when no additional plugins have been enabled.
Apache Struts patched the vulnerability with the release of Struts versions 2.3.35 and 2.5.17 last month. Now, Cisco has also released fixes to address the issue in its several products. You can check the list of vulnerable Cisco products here.
Since there are no workarounds for this issue, organizations and developers are strongly advised to update their Struts components as soon as possible.
Cisco Umbrella API Unauthorized Access Vulnerability (CVE-2018-0435)
The second critical vulnerability patched by Cisco resides in the Cisco Umbrella API that could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to view and modify data across their organization as well as other organizations.
Cisco Umbrella is a cloud security platform that provides the first line of defense against threats over all ports and protocols by blocking access to malicious domains, URLs, IPs, and files before a connection is ever established or a file is downloaded.
The vulnerability resides due to insufficient authentication configurations for the API interface of Cisco Umbrella, and successful exploitation could allow an attacker to read or modify data across multiple organizations.
Cisco has patched the vulnerability addressed this vulnerability in the Cisco Umbrella production APIs. No user action is required.
Cisco Routers Management Interface Buffer Overflow Vulnerability (CVE-2018-0423)
The last, but not the least, critical vulnerability resides in the web-based management interface of the Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall, Cisco RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router, and Cisco RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router that could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code or cause a DoS condition.
The flaw occurs due to improper boundary restrictions on user-supplied input in the Guest user feature of the web-based management interface.
To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker can send malicious requests to a targeted device, triggering a buffer overflow condition.
"A successful exploit could allow the attacker to cause the device to stop responding, resulting in a denial of service condition, or could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary code," the company explains.
This vulnerability affects all releases of Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall, RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router, and RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router.
Cisco has addressed this vulnerability in firmware release 1.0.3.44 for the Cisco RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router, and will not release firmware updates for the Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall and Cisco RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router.
According to the company's Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT), Apache Struts is being exploited in the wild, while the team is not aware of any exploits leveraging the other two critical flaws.
The Bottom Line: Patch! Patch! Patch!
| Vulnerability |
Pre-Installed Password Manager On Windows 10 Lets Hackers Steal All Your Passwords | https://thehackernews.com/2017/12/windows-10-password-manager.html | If you are running Windows 10 on your PC, then there are chances that your computer contains a pre-installed 3rd-party password manager app that lets attackers steal all your credentials remotely.
Starting from Windows 10 Anniversary Update (Version 1607), Microsoft added a new feature called Content Delivery Manager that silently installs new "suggested apps" without asking for users' permission.
According to a blog post published Friday on Chromium Blog, Google Project Zero researcher Tavis Ormandy said he found a pre-installed famous password manager, called "Keeper," on his freshly installed Windows 10 system which he downloaded directly from the Microsoft Developer Network.
Ormandy was not the only one who noticed the Keeper Password Manager. Some Reddit users complained about the hidden password manager about six months ago, one of which reported Keeper being installed on a virtual machine created with Windows 10 Pro.
Critical Flaw In Keeper Password Manager
Knowing that a third-party password manager now comes installed by default on Windows 10, Ormandy started testing the software and took no longer to discover a critical vulnerability that leads to "complete compromise of Keeper security, allowing any website to steal any password."
"I don't want to hear about how even a password manager with a trivial remote root that shares all your passwords with every website is better than nothing. People really tell me this," Ormandy tweeted.
The security vulnerability in the Keeper Password Manager was almost identical to the one Ormandy discovered and reported in the non-bundled version of the same Keeper plugin in August 2016 that enabled malicious websites to steal passwords.
"I checked and, they're doing the same thing again with this version. I think I'm being generous considering this a new issue that qualifies for a ninety day disclosure, as I literally just changed the selectors and the same attack works," Ormandy said.
To explain the severity of the bug, Ormandy also provided a working proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit that steals a user's Twitter password if it is stored in the Keeper app.
Install Updated Keeper Password Manager
Ormandy reported the vulnerability to the Keeper developers, who acknowledged the issue and released a fix in the just released version 11.4 on Friday by removing the vulnerable "add to existing" functionality.
Since the vulnerability only affects version 11 of the Keeper app, which was released on December 6 as a major browser extension update, the vulnerability is different from the one Ormandy reported six months ago.
Keeper has also added that the company has not noticed any attack using this security vulnerability in the wild.
As for Windows 10 users, Ormandy said users wouldn't be vulnerable to the password theft unless they open Keeper password manager and enable the software to store their passwords.
However, Microsoft still needs to explain how the Keeper password manager gets installed on the users' computers without their knowledge.
Meanwhile, users can use this registry tweak to disable Content Delivery Manager in order to prevent Microsoft from installing unwanted apps silently on their PCs.
| Vulnerability |
These Top 7 Brutal Cyber Attacks Prove 'No One is Immune to Hacking' — Part I | https://thehackernews.com/2015/09/top-cyber-attacks-1.html | If you believe that your organization is not at real risk of cyber attack, then you are absolutely wrong.
Incidents of massive data breaches, advanced cyber attacks coming from China, groups like Syrian Electronic Army, Hacking Point of Sale machines at retailers such as Target have splashed across the news in the last one year.
Whether a Government Agency or Private Company, Small or a Large Tech Company....
...It's no secret that No one is Immune to Cyber Attacks.
This article is the first in a two-part series from The Hacker News, listing first four out of Top 7 Brutal Cyber Attacks.
And here we go...
#1 "Hacking Team" Data Breach
Hacking Team, the controversial spyware company, recently been hacked by some unidentified hackers that exposed over 400 gigabytes of its internal sensitive data on the Internet.
Milan (Italy) based IT firm 'Hacking Team' sells intrusion and surveillance software solutions to Governments and Law Enforcement agencies worldwide.
Hacking Team is infamous for its commercial surveillance tool named as Remote Control System (RCS), which is capable of spying activities and remotely accessing target system's microphone and camera.
However, sometimes even Hackers get Hacked! So same happened with Hacking Team when hackers not only defaced Hacking Team's own Twitter account but also leaked:
Executive Emails
Source codes for Hacking and Spyware Tools
Zero-day exploits, including for Flash, Internet Explorer
Government client list with date of purchase and amount paid
…Marking the attack as one of the biggest cyber attacks on any Company.
One of the aspects of the data breach showed the lack of protection implementations within the organization and using weak passwords.
#2 Ashley Madison Data Breach
TIP: No website can guarantee privacy of your identity, Credit card details, personal photos or any other information. [Read more]
Two months ago, Toronto-based Ashley Madison website, popular as an online Married Dating portal for extramarital affairs with the tagline "Life is Short. Have an Affair," was hacked by 'The Impact Team'.
Hackers allegedly gained access to millions of its customers information database and posted 10GB of personal data for its tens of Millions of customers, including their names and email addresses.
Frequently followed by another leak, where hackers released another 20GB of company's internal data, including personal e-mails from the CEO of Ashley Madison parent company Avid Life, Noel Biderman, along with the source code for its website and mobile apps.
The breach came just two months after an attack on another scandalous site, Adult Friend Finder where again millions of people's very personal data were left exposed on the Internet.
The Ashley Madison and Adult Friend Finder hacking cases raise serious questions about what these dating websites are doing to ensure the security of their users' personal information.
#3 The Sony Pictures Hack
Remember last year when you were able to download and watch unreleased movies of Sony Pictures Entertainment?
Annie, Mr. Turner, Still Alice, To Write Love On Her Arms, and Brad Pitt's "Fury"...
...were leaked online on torrent websites, following a massive cyber attack on Sony Pictures last year by the Guardians of Peace (GOP) hacking group.
The hack wasn't limited to unreleased movies — the unknown hackers leaked about 200 gigabytes of confidential data belonging to Sony Pictures from movie scripts to sensitive employees data, celebrity's' phone numbers and their travel aliases, making it the most severe hack in the History.
The massive cyber attack on the company was in response to the release of "The Interview" — a controversial North Korean-baiting film, where hackers threatened 9/11 Type attack at Theaters showing this movie.
As a result, Sony had to shut down its services for weeks. However, it struggled to solve the issue by pulling "The Interview" from theaters and eventually putting it up on Netflix.
But, things have not changed much for Sony. This was the second time Sony was targeted, and the intensity of the attack was such that even after taking the best measures, a subsequent amount of the company's data was leaked to WikiLeaks.
#4 'Fappening' and 'Snappening'
When a surge of Nude Photos of Celebrities were leaked and went viral in August of 2014, the Internet had a meltdown.
Unknown Hacker was able to break into third-party applications connected to services like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Apple's iCloud that led to a major incident known as "The Fappening".
The Fappening mainly attacked female celebrities and leaked very private photographs of them, including Jennifer Lawrence, Kim Kardashian, Kirsten Dunst, Avril Lavigne and many others.
Within a month of "The Fappening," another similar incident called "The Snappening" happened that leaked more than 100,000 nude videos and images of the Snapchat users.
In The Fappening, the Naked Pictures were allegedly retrieved due to a "brute force" security flaw in Apple's iCloud file storage service. However, Apple denied it.
In case of The Snappening, Snapchat's servers were not breached. Instead, the nude pictures of users were compromised due to third-party apps used to send and receive Snaps.
However, both the incidents marked as the biggest hacks of one of its kind.
Further Read: Part II — Top 7 Brutal Cyber Attacks Proves that No One is Immune to Hacking.
| Data_Breaches |
Emotet Malware Destroys Itself From All Infected Computers | https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/emotet-malware-destroys-itself-today.html | Emotet, the notorious email-based Windows malware behind several botnet-driven spam campaigns and ransomware attacks, was automatically wiped from infected computers en masse following a European law enforcement operation.
The development comes three months after a coordinated disruption of Emotet as part of "Operation Ladybird" to seize control of servers used to run and maintain the malware network. The orchestrated effort saw at least 700 servers associated with the botnet's infrastructure neutered from the inside, thus preventing further exploitation.
Law enforcement authorities from the Netherlands, Germany, the U.S., U.K., France, Lithuania, Canada, and Ukraine were involved in the international action.
Previously, the Dutch police, which seized two central servers located in the country, said it had deployed a software update to counter the threat posed by Emotet effectively. "All infected computer systems will automatically retrieve the update there, after which the Emotet infection will be quarantined," the agency noted back in January.
This involved pushing a 32-bit payload named "EmotetLoader.dll" via the same channels that were used to distribute the original Emotet to all compromised machines. The cleanup routine, which was set to trigger itself automatically on April 25, 2021, worked by removing the malware from the device, in addition to deleting the autorun Registry key and terminating the process.
Now on Sunday, cybersecurity firm Malwarebytes confirmed that its Emotet-infected machine that had received the specially-crafted time bomb code had successfully initiated the uninstallation routine and removed itself from the Windows system.
As of writing, Abuse.ch's Feodo Tracker shows none of the Emotet servers are online. However, it remains to be seen if this "final" blow to the botnet will cause it to bounce back in the future or render it permanently inoperable, paving the way for other cybercrime actors to fill the void.
"Historically, Emotet's operators used long breaks in activity to improve their malware," Redscan researchers noted on Friday. "This means there is a realistic possibility that Emotet's operators will use this opportunity to make the loader malware even more resilient, for example, by using polymorphic techniques to counter future coordinated action. They could also use the Emotet source code to branch off and create smaller, independent botnets."
The mass action marks the second time law enforcement agencies have intervened to remove malware from compromised machines.
Earlier this month, the U.S. government took steps to remove web shell backdoors dropped by the Hafnium threat actor from Microsoft Exchange servers located in the country that were breached using ProxyLogon exploits.
Following the court-authorized operation, the Federal Bureau of Investigation said it's in the process of notifying all the organizations from which it had removed web shells, implying the intelligence agency accessed the systems without their knowledge.
| Malware |
16-Year-Old Teenager arrested for World's biggest cyber attack ever | https://thehackernews.com/2013/09/16-year-old-teenager-arrested-for.html | 16-Year-Old Teenager has been arrested over his alleged involvement in the World's biggest largest DDoS attacks against the Dutch anti-spam group Spamhaus.
The teenager, whose name is unknown at this point, was arrested by British police in April, but details of his arrest were just leaked to the British press on Thursday.
He was taken into custody when police swooped on his south-west London home after investigations identified significant sums of money were flowing through his bank account. The suspect was found with his computer systems open and logged on to various virtual systems and forums.
The March 20 attack on Spamhaus has been dubbed as the "biggest cyber attack in the history of the Internet" which saw server of the Dutch anti-spam organization being bombarded with traffic in tune of 300 billion bits per second (300Gbps).
A DDoS attack takes place when hackers use an army of infected computers to send traffic to a server, causing a shutdown in the process.
It's unclear what role the teenager played in the massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. The boy has been released on bail until later this year. A 35-year-old Dutchman was detained and his computers, data carriers and mobile phones were seized, local media speculates that the person is none other than CyberBunker spokesman Sven Olaf Kamphuis.
The attack on Spamhaus is believed to have started after the anti-spam organization blacklisted CyberBunker for allegedly spreading spam.
| Cyber_Attack |
New Banking malware 'i2Ninja' being sold via underground Russian Cybercrime Market | https://thehackernews.com/2013/11/new-banking-malware-i2ninja-being-sold.html | Researchers at Trusteer spotted a new banking malware program on the underground Russian cybercrime market, that communicates with attackers over the I2P anonymity network is for sale on underground Russian cybercrime forums.
Dubbed 'i2Ninja', malware has most of the features found in other financial malware including the ability to perform HTML injections and form grabbing in Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome. i2Ninja can also steal FTP and e-mail credentials. It also has a PokerGrabber module feature that targets poker sites.
The traffic between the malware and the command server cannot be easily blocked by intrusion prevention systems or firewalls because it's encrypted and transmitting over the Invisible Internet Project (I2P).
Everything from delivering configuration updates to receiving stolen data and sending commands is done via the encrypted I2P channels.
I2P communication can make it much harder for security researchers to find and take down those servers and the malware also offers buyers a proxy for anonymous Internet browsing, promising complete online anonymity.
Another unique feature of this malware is that it comes with an integrated help desk ticketing system. "A potential buyer can communicate with the authors / support team, open tickets and get answers - all while enjoying the security and anonymity provided by I2P's encrypted messaging nature," Trusteer says.
The few other malware also has such marketed support i.e. Citadel and the Neosploit Exploit Pack. It's not known if i2Ninja is already being used to infect computers.
With increasing black market activity and the release of various malware source code, we expect to see a new malware variants and new underground offering in 2014, they say.
| Malware |
Magento Hackers Using Simple Evasion Trick to Reinfect Sites With Malware | https://thehackernews.com/2018/06/magento-security-hacking.html | Security researchers have been warning of a new trick that cybercriminals are leveraging to hide their malicious code designed to re-introduce the infection to steal confidential information from Magento based online e-commerce websites.
So, if you have already cleaned up your hacked Magento website, there are chances your website is still leaking login credentials and credit card details of your customers to hackers.
More than 250,000 online stores use open-source Magento e-commerce platform, which makes them an enticing target for hackers, and therefore the security of both your data and your customer data is of the utmost importance.
According to the researchers at Sucuri, who have previously spotted several Magento malware campaigns in the wild, cybercriminals are currently using a simple yet effective method to ensure that their malicious code is added back to a hacked website after it has been removed.
To achieve this, criminals are hiding their 'credit card stealer reinfector' code inside the default configuration file (config.php) of Magento website, which gets included on the main index.php and loads with every page view, eventually re-injecting the stealer code into multiple files of the website.
Since config.php file gets automatically configured while installing Magento CMS, usually it is not recommended for administrators or website owners to change the content of this file directly.
Here's How Magento's Reinfector Code Works
The reinfector code spotted by researchers is quite interesting as it has been written in a way that no security scanner can easily identify and detect it, as well as it hardly looks malicious for an untrained eye.
Hackers have added 54 extra lines of code in the default configuration file. Here below, I have explained the malicious reinfector code line-by-line, shown in the screenshots, written inside the default config.php file.
At line no. 27, attackers set error_reporting() function to false in an attempt to hide errors messages that could reveal the path of the malicious module to site admins.
From line no. 31 to 44, there's a function called patch() that has been programmed to append the malicious code for stealing confidential information into legitimate Magento files.
This patch() function uses 4 arguments, values of which defines the path of a folder, name of a specific file resides in that path needs to be infected, file size required to check if it is necessary to reinfect the given file, a new file name to be created, and a remote URL from where the malicious code will be downloaded in real-time and injected into the targeted file.
From line 50 to 51, attackers have smartly split up the base64_decode() function in multiple parts in order to evade detection from security scanners.
The line 52 includes a base64 encoded value that converts to "https://pastebin.com/raw/" after getting decoded using the function defined in line 50-51.
The next four sets of variables from line 54 to 76 define the four values required to pass arguments to the patch() function mentioned above.
The last line of each set includes a random eight character value that concatenated with the link variable encoded in line 52, which eventually generates the final URL from where the patch() function will download the malicious code hosted on remote Pastebin website.
From line 78 to 81, attacker finally executes patch() function four times with different values defined in line 54-76 to reinfect website with the credit card stealer.
"As a rule of thumb, on every Magento installation where a compromise is suspected to have taken place, the /includes/config.php should be verified quickly," researchers advise.
It should be noted that similar technique can also be used against websites based on other content management system platforms such as Joomla and WordPress to hide malicious code.
Since attackers mostly exploit known vulnerabilities to compromise websites at the very first place, users are always recommended to keep their website software and servers updated with the latest security patches.
| Malware |
LuckyMouse Hackers Target Banks, Companies and Governments in 2020 | https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/luckymouse-hackers-target-banks.html | An adversary known for its watering hole attacks against government entities has been linked to a slew of newly detected intrusions targeting various organizations in Central Asia and the Middle East.
The malicious activity, collectively named "EmissarySoldier," has been attributed to a threat actor called LuckyMouse, and is said to have happened in 2020 with the goal of obtaining geopolitical insights in the region. The attacks involved deploying a toolkit dubbed SysUpdate (aka Soldier) in a number of breached organizations, including government and diplomatic agencies, telecom providers, a TV media company, and a commercial bank.
LuckyMouse, also referred to as APT27 and Emissary Panda, is a sophisticated cyberespionage group that has a history of breaching multiple government networks in Central Asia and the Middle East. The actor has also been linked to cyberattacks aimed at transnational organizations such as the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) in 2019 and recently attracted attention for exploiting ProxyLogon flaws to compromise the email server of a governmental entity in the Middle East.
EmissarySoldier is only the latest in a series of surveillance efforts aimed at the targets.
"In order to compromise victims, LuckyMouse typically uses watering holes, compromising websites likely to be visited by its intended targets, ESET malware researcher Matthieu Faou said in a report published today. "LuckyMouse operators also perform network scans to find vulnerable internet-facing servers run by their intended victims."
What's more, ESET also observed LuckyMouse infections on an unspecified number of internet-facing systems running Microsoft SharePoint, which the researchers suspect occurred by taking advantage of remote code execution vulnerabilities in the application.
Regardless of the method used to gain an initial foothold, the attack chain culminates in the deployment of custom post-compromise implants, SysUpdate or HyperBro, both of which leverage DLL search order hijacking to load malicious payloads and thwart detection. "The trident model features a legitimate application vulnerable to DLL hijacking, a custom DLL that loads the payload, and a raw Shikata Ga Nai-encoded binary payload," Faou noted.
For its part, SysUpdate functions as a modular tool, with each component devoted to a particular operational purpose. It involves abusing a benign application as a loader for a malicious DLL, which in turn loads the first-stage payload that ultimately decodes and deploys the memory implant on the compromised system. Since its discovery in 2018, the toolkit has undergone numerous revisions devoted to adding new functionalities, indicating that the operators are actively working to revamp their malware arsenal.
"LuckyMouse was increasingly active throughout 2020, seemingly going through a retooling process in which various features were being incrementally integrated into the SysUpdate toolkit," Faou said. "This may be an indicator that the threat actors behind LuckyMouse are gradually shifting from using HyperBro to SysUpdate."
| Cyber_Attack |
Researchers Get $10,000 for Hacking Google Server with Malicious XML | https://thehackernews.com/2014/04/hacking-google-server-XML-External-Entity.html | A critical vulnerability has been uncovered in Google that could allow an attacker to access the internal files of Google's production servers. Sounds ridiculous but has been proven by the security researchers from Detectify.
The vulnerability resides in the Toolbar Button Gallery (as shown). The team of researchers found a loophole after they noticed that Google Toolbar Button Gallery allows users to customize their toolbars with new buttons. So, for the developers, it is easy to create their own buttons by uploading XML files containing metadata for styling and other such properties.
This feature of Google search engine is vulnerable to XML External Entity (XXE). It is an XML injection that allows an attacker to force a badly configured XML parser to "include" or "load" unwanted functionality that can compromise the security of a web application.
"The root cause of XXE vulnerabilities is naive XML parsers that blindly interpret the DTD of the user supplied XML documents. By doing so, you risk having your parser doing a bunch of nasty things. Some issues include: local file access, SSRF and remote file includes, Denial of Service and possible remote code execution. If you want to know how to patch these issues, check out the OWASP page on how to secure XML parsers in various languages and platforms," the researchers wrote on a blog post.
Using the same, the researchers crafted their own button containing fishy XML entities. By sending it, they gain access to internal files stored in one of Google's production servers and managed to read the "/etc/passwd" and the "/etc/hosts" files from the server.
By exploiting the same vulnerability the researchers said they could have access any other file on their server, or could have gain access to their internal systems through the SSRF exploitation.
The researchers straight away reported the vulnerability to the Google's security team and rewarded with $10,000 (€7,200) bounty for identifying an XML External Entity (XXE) vulnerability in one of the search engine's features.
| Vulnerability |
Subsets and Splits