Medusa Ransomware Uses Malicious Driver to Disable Anti-Malware with Stolen Certificates
Mar 21, 2025
Ransomware / BYOVD
The threat actors behind the Medusa ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) operation have been observed using a malicious driver dubbed ABYSSWORKER as part of a bring your own vulnerable driver ( BYOVD ) attack designed to disable anti-malware tools. Elastic Security Labs said it observed a Medusa ransomware attack that delivered the encryptor by means of a loader packed using a packer-as-a-service (PaaS) called HeartCrypt. "This loader was deployed alongside a revoked certificate-signed driver from a Chinese vendor we named ABYSSWORKER, which it installs on the victim machine and then uses to target and silence different EDR vendors," the company said in a report. The driver in question, "smuol.sys," mimics a legitimate CrowdStrike Falcon driver ("CSAgent.sys"). Dozens of ABYSSWORKER artifacts have been detected on the VirusTotal platform dating from August 8, 2024, to February 25, 2025. All the identified samples are signed using likely stolen, revoked ce...