Researchers Warn of 'Matanbuchus' Malware Campaign Dropping Cobalt Strike Beacons

A malware-as-a-service Maas dubbed Matanbuchus has been observed spreading through phishing campaigns, ultimately dropping the Cobalt Strike post-exploitation framework on compromised machines. Matanbuchus, like other malware loaders such as BazarLoader, Bumblebee, and Colibri, is engineered to...

Learn NIST Inside Out With 21 Hours of Training @ 86% OFF

In cybersecurity, many of the best jobs involve working on government projects. To get a security clearance, you need to prove that you meet NIST standards. Cybersecurity firms are particularly interested in people who understand the RMF, or Risk Management Framework — a U.S. government guideline...

Hackers Exploit Mitel VoIP Zero-Day in Likely Ransomware Attack

A suspected ransomware intrusion attempt against an unnamed target leveraged a Mitel VoIP appliance as an entry point to achieve remote code execution and gain initial access to the environment. The findings come from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, which traced the source of the attack to a...

Google Says ISPs Helped Attackers Infect Targeted Smartphones with Hermit Spyware

A week after it emerged that a sophisticated mobile spyware dubbed Hermit was used by the government of Kazakhstan within its borders, Google said it has notified Android users of infected devices. Additionally, necessary changes have been implemented in Google Play Protect — Android's built-in...

Multiple Backdoored Python Libraries Caught Stealing AWS Secrets and Keys

Researchers have discovered a number of malicious Python packages in the official third-party software repository that are engineered to exfiltrate AWS credentials and environment variables to a publicly exposed endpoint. The list of packages includes loglib-modules, pyg-modules, pygrata,...

State-Backed Hackers Using Ransomware as a Decoy for Cyber Espionage Attacks

A China-based advanced persistent threat APT group is possibly deploying short-lived ransomware families as a decoy to cover up the true operational and tactical objectives behind its campaigns. The activity cluster, attributed to a hacking group dubbed Bronze Starlight by Secureworks, involves t...

New 'Quantum' Builder Lets Attackers Easily Create Malicious Windows Shortcuts

A new malware tool that enables cybercriminal actors to build malicious Windows shortcut .LNK files has been spotted for sale on cybercrime forums. Dubbed Quantum Lnk Builder, the software makes it possible to spoof any extension and choose from over 300 icons, not to mention support UAC and...

Log4Shell Still Being Exploited to Hack VMWare Servers to Exfiltrate Sensitive Data

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency CISA, along with the Coast Guard Cyber Command CGCYBER, on Thursday released a joint advisory warning of continued attempts on the part of threat actors to exploit the Log4Shell flaw in VMware Horizon servers to breach target networks...

NSO Confirms Pegasus Spyware Used by at least 5 European Countries

The beleaguered Israeli surveillanceware vendor NSO Group this week admitted to the European Union lawmakers that its Pegasus tool was used by at least five countries in the region. "We're trying to do the right thing and that's more than other companies working in the industry," Chaim Gelfand, t...

Manual vs. SSPM: Research on What Streamlines SaaS Security Detection & Remediation

When it comes to keeping SaaS stacks secure, IT and security teams need to be able to streamline the detection and remediation of misconfigurations in order to best protect their SaaS stack from threats. However, while companies adopt more and more apps, their increase in SaaS security tools and...

Chinese Hackers Distributing SMS Bomber Tool with Malware Hidden Inside

A threat cluster with ties to a hacking group called Tropic Trooper has been spotted using a previously undocumented malware coded in Nim language to strike targets as part of a newly discovered campaign. The novel loader, dubbed Nimbda, is "bundled with a Chinese language greyware 'SMS Bomber'...

Critical PHP Vulnerability Exposes QNAP NAS Devices to Remote Attacks

QNAP, Taiwanese maker of network-attached storage NAS devices, on Wednesday said it's in the process of fixing a critical three-year-old PHP vulnerability that could be abused to achieve remote code execution. "A vulnerability has been reported to affect PHP versions 7.1.x below 7.1.33, 7.2.x bel...

Researchers Uncover Ways to Break the Encryption of 'MEGA' Cloud Storage Service

A new piece of research from academics at ETH Zurich has identified a number of critical security issues in the MEGA cloud storage service that could be leveraged to break the confidentiality and integrity of user data. In a paper titled "MEGA: Malleable Encryption Goes Awry," the researchers poi...

Russian Hackers Exploiting Microsoft Follina Vulnerability Against Ukraine

The Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine CERT-UA has cautioned of a new set of spear-phishing attacks exploiting the "Follina" flaw in the Windows operating system to deploy password-stealing malware. Attributing the intrusions to a Russian nation-state group tracked as APT28 aka Fancy Bea...

Newly Discovered Magecart Infrastructure Reveals the Scale of Ongoing Campaign

A newly discovered Magecart skimming campaign has its roots in a previous attack activity going all the way back to November 2021. To that end, it has come to light that two malware domains identified as hosting credit card skimmer code — "scanalytic.org" and "js.staticounter.net" — are part of a...

Europol Busts Phishing Gang Responsible for Millions in Losses

Europol on Tuesday announced the dismantling of an organized crime group that dabbled in phishing, fraud, scams, and money laundering activities. The cross-border operation, which involved law enforcement authorities from Belgium and the Netherlands, saw the arrests of nine individuals in the Dut...

RIG Exploit Kit Now Infects Victims' PCs With Dridex Instead of Raccoon Stealer

The operators behind the Rig Exploit Kit have swapped the Raccoon Stealer malware for the Dridex financial trojan as part of an ongoing campaign that commenced in January 2022. The switch in modus operandi, spotted by Romanian company Bitdefender, comes in the wake of Raccoon Stealer temporarily...

New ToddyCat Hacker Group on Experts' Radar After Targeting MS Exchange Servers

An advanced persistent threat APT actor codenamed ToddyCat has been linked to a string of attacks aimed at government and military entities in Europe and Asia since at least December 2020. The relatively new adversarial collective is said to have commenced its operations by targeting Microsoft...

Researchers Disclose 56 Vulnerabilities Impacting OT Devices from 10 Vendors

Nearly five dozen security vulnerabilities have been disclosed in devices from 10 operational technology OT vendors due to what researchers call are "insecure-by-design practices." Collectively dubbed OT:ICEFALL by Forescout, the 56 issues span as many as 26 device models from Bently Nevada,...

Mitigate Ransomware in a Remote-First World

Ransomware has been a thorn in the side of cybersecurity teams for years. With the move to remote and hybrid work, this insidious threat has become even more of a challenge for organizations everywhere. 2021 was a case study in ransomware due to the wide variety of attacks, significant financial...

Former Amazon Employee Found Guilty in 2019 Capital One Data Breach

A 36-year-old former Amazon employee was convicted of wire fraud and computer intrusions in the U.S. for her role in the theft of personal data of no fewer than 100 million people in the 2019 Capital One breach. Paige Thompson, who operated under the online alias "erratic" and worked for the tech...

New NTLM Relay Attack Lets Attackers Take Control Over Windows Domain

A new kind of Windows NTLM relay attack dubbed DFSCoerce has been uncovered that leverages the Distributed File System DFS: Namespace Management Protocol MS-DFSNM to seize control of a domain. "Spooler service disabled, RPC filters installed to prevent PetitPotam and File Server VSS Agent Service...

Do You Have Ransomware Insurance? Look at the Fine Print

Insurance exists to protect the insured party against catastrophe, but the insurer needs protection so that its policies are not abused – and that's where the fine print comes in. However, in the case of ransomware insurance, the fine print is becoming contentious and arguably undermining the...

Google Researchers Detail 5-Year-Old Apple Safari Vulnerability Exploited in the Wild

A security flaw in Apple Safari that was exploited in the wild earlier this year was originally fixed in 2013 and reintroduced in December 2016, according to a new report from Google Project Zero. The issue, tracked as CVE-2022-22620 CVSS score: 8.8, concerns a case of a use-after-free...

BRATA Android Malware Gains Advanced Mobile Threat Capabilities

The operators behind BRATA have once again added more capabilities to the Android mobile malware in an attempt to make their attacks against financial apps more stealthy. "In fact, the modus operandi now fits into an Advanced Persistent Threat APT activity pattern," Italian cybersecurity firm...

Over a Dozen Flaws Found in Siemens' Industrial Network Management System

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details about 15 security flaws in Siemens SINEC network management system NMS, some of which could be chained by an attacker to achieve remote code execution on affected systems. "The vulnerabilities, if exploited, pose a number of risks to Siemens device...

Learn Cybersecurity with Palo Alto Networks Through this PCCSA Course @ 93% OFF

In the world of cybersecurity, reputation is everything. Most business owners have little understanding of the technical side, so they have to rely on credibility. Founded back in 2005, Palo Alto Networks is a cybersecurity giant that has earned the trust of the business community thanks to its...

Authorities Shut Down Russian RSOCKS Botnet That Hacked Millions of Devices

The U.S. Department of Justice DoJ on Thursday disclosed that it took down the infrastructure associated with a Russian botnet known as RSOCKS in collaboration with law enforcement partners in Germany, the Netherlands, and the U.K. The botnet, operated by a sophisticated cybercrime organization, ...

Atlassian Confluence Flaw Being Used to Deploy Ransomware and Crypto Miners

A recently patched critical security flaw in Atlassian Confluence Server and Data Center products is being actively weaponized in real-world attacks to drop cryptocurrency miners and ransomware payloads. In at least two of the Windows-related incidents observed by cybersecurity vendor Sophos,...

Researchers Uncover 'Hermit' Android Spyware Used in Kazakhstan, Syria, and Italy

An enterprise-grade surveillanceware dubbed Hermit has been put to use by entities operating from within Kazakhstan, Syria, and Italy over the years since 2019, new research has revealed. Lookout attributed the spy software, which is equipped to target both Android and iOS, to an Italian company...

Reimagine Hybrid Work: Same CyberSec in Office and at Home

It was first the pandemic that changed the usual state of work - before, it was commuting, working in the office & coming home for most corporate employees. Then, when we had to adapt to the self-isolation rules, the work moved to home offices, which completely changed the workflow for many...

Chinese Hackers Exploited Sophos Firewall Zero-Day Flaw to Target South Asian Entity

A sophisticated Chinese advanced persistent threat APT actor exploited a critical security vulnerability in Sophos' firewall product that came to light earlier this year to infiltrate an unnamed South Asian target as part of a highly-targeted attack. "The attacker implemented an interesting web...

Over a Million WordPress Sites Forcibly Updated to Patch a Critical Plugin Vulnerability

WordPress websites using a widely used plugin named Ninja Forms have been updated automatically to remediate a critical security vulnerability that's suspected of having been actively exploited in the wild. The issue, which relates to a case of code injection, is rated 9.8 out of 10 for severity...

BlackCat Ransomware Gang Targeting Unpatched Microsoft Exchange Servers

Microsoft is warning that the BlackCat ransomware crew is leveraging exploits for unpatched Exchange server vulnerabilities to gain access to targeted networks. Upon gaining an entry point, the attackers swiftly moved to gather information about the compromised machines, followed by carrying out...

A Microsoft Office 365 Feature Could Help Ransomware Hackers Hold Cloud Files Hostage

A "dangerous piece of functionality" has been discovered in Microsoft 365 suite that could be potentially abused by a malicious actor to mount attacks on cloud infrastructure and ransom files stored on SharePoint and OneDrive. The cloud ransomware attack makes it possible to launch file-encryptin...

Difference Between Agent-Based and Network-Based Internal Vulnerability Scanning

For years, the two most popular methods for internal scanning: agent-based and network-based were considered to be about equal in value, each bringing its own strengths to bear. However, with remote working now the norm in most if not all workplaces, it feels a lot more like agent-based scanning ...

High-Severity RCE Vulnerability Reported in Popular Fastjson Library

Cybersecurity researchers have detailed a recently patched high-severity security vulnerability in the popular Fastjson library that could be potentially exploited to achieve remote code execution. Tracked as CVE-2022-25845 CVSS score: 8.1, the issue relates to a case of deserialization of...

MaliBot: A New Android Banking Trojan Spotted in the Wild

A new strain of Android malware has been spotted in the wild targeting online banking and cryptocurrency wallet customers in Spain and Italy, just weeks after a coordinated law enforcement operation dismantled FluBot. The information stealing trojan, codenamed MaliBot by F5 Labs, is as feature-ri...

Critical Flaw in Cisco Secure Email and Web Manager Lets Attackers Bypass Authentication

Cisco on Wednesday rolled out fixes to address a critical security flaw affecting Email Security Appliance ESA and Secure Email and Web Manager that could be exploited by an unauthenticated, remote attacker to sidestep authentication. Assigned the CVE identifier CVE-2022-20798, the bypass...

Panchan: A New Golang-based Peer-To-Peer Botnet Targeting Linux Servers

A new Golang-based peer-to-peer P2P botnet has been spotted actively targeting Linux servers in the education sector since its emergence in March 2022. Dubbed Panchan by Akamai Security Research, the malware "utilizes its built-in concurrency features to maximize spreadability and execute malware...

New Hertzbleed Side Channel Attack Affects All Modern AMD and Intel CPUs

A newly discovered security vulnerability in modern Intel and AMD processors could let remote attackers steal encryption keys via a power side channel attack. Dubbed Hertzbleed by a group of researchers from the University of Texas, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and the University ...

Comprehensive, Easy Cybersecurity for Lean IT Security Teams Starts with XDR

Breaches don't just happen to large enterprises. Threat actors are increasingly targeting small businesses. In fact, 43% of data breaches involved small to medium-sized businesses. But there is a glaring discrepancy. Larger businesses typically have the budget to keep their lights on if they are...

Cloudflare Saw Record-Breaking DDoS Attack Peaking at 26 Million Request Per Second

Cloudflare on Tuesday disclosed that it had acted to prevent a record-setting 26 million request per second RPS distributed denial-of-service DDoS attack last week, making it the largest HTTPS DDoS attack detected to date. The web performance and security company said the attack was directed...

Patch Tuesday: Microsoft Issues Fix for Actively Exploited 'Follina' Vulnerability

Microsoft finally released fixes to address an actively exploited Windows zero-day vulnerability known as Follina as part of its Patch Tuesday updates. Also addressed by the tech giant are 55 other flaws, three of which are rated Critical, 51 are rated Important, and one is rated Moderate in...

New Zimbra Email Vulnerability Could Let Attackers Steal Your Login Credentials

A new high-severity vulnerability has been disclosed in the Zimbra email suite that, if successfully exploited, enables an unauthenticated attacker to steal cleartext passwords of users sans any user interaction. "With the consequent access to the victims' mailboxes, attackers can potentially...

What is the Essential Eight (And Why Non-Aussies Should Care)

In 2017, The Australian Cyber Security Center ACSC published a set of mitigation strategies that were designed to help organizations to protect themselves against cyber security incidents. These strategies, which became known as the Essential Eight, are designed specifically for use on Windows...

Technical Details Released for 'SynLapse' RCE Vulnerability Reported in Microsoft Azure

Microsoft has incorporated additional improvements to address the recently disclosed SynLapse security vulnerability in order to meet comprehensive tenant isolation requirements in Azure Data Factory and Azure Synapse Pipelines. The latest safeguards include moving the shared integration runtimes...

Unpatched Travis CI API Bug Exposes Thousands of Secret User Access Tokens

An unpatched security issue in the Travis CI API has left tens of thousands of developers' user tokens exposed to potential attacks, effectively allowing threat actors to breach cloud infrastructures, make unauthorized code changes, and initiate supply chain attacks. "More than 770 million logs o...

New Syslogk Linux Rootkit Lets Attackers Remotely Command It Using "Magic Packets"

A new covert Linux kernel rootkit named Syslogk has been spotted under development in the wild and cloaking a malicious payload that can be remotely commandeered by an adversary using a magic network traffic packet. "The Syslogk rootkit is heavily based on Adore-Ng but incorporates new...

Researchers Detail PureCrypter Loader Cyber Criminals Using to Distribute Malware

Cybersecurity researchers have detailed the workings of a fully-featured malware loader dubbed PureCrypter that's being purchased by cyber criminals to deliver remote access trojans RATs and information stealers. "The loader is a .NET executable obfuscated with SmartAssembly and makes use of...