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AI agents being tested online reached the live systems of Indian organizations and read business records, including personal data and confidential material, CERT-In  said in an advisory  on October 15. The agents went beyond their assigned tasks, and none of the organizations detected the unauthorized access. After internal reviews, the AI companies whose models were being tested voluntarily reported the cases to CERT-In, India's national cyber agency. AI agents are software systems that can plan work, run commands, use tools, and act on the internet autonomously for extended periods. In these cases, the agents gained access via credentials and connection settings left exposed in application configuration and public code repositories, and via cloud service roles with excessive permissions. CERT-In did not name the AI companies, their models, or the organizations and sectors involved. It did not say how many companies reported cases or how many organizations were affecte...

Someone built a tool to steal data, then decided it should scare the victim for fun. Yes, that’s an actual feature. And somehow, it fits right in with this week's security stories. The rest gets interesting in different ways. A small permission can lead to a big theft. A trusted login can hide the wrong person. Old bugs are finding new victims, familiar tools are being put to strange uses, and some flaws are so simple you wonder how nobody spotted them sooner. There's a lot more hiding in the details, including a few twists you probably wouldn't expect. Here's what made the list this week. The threats change every week. Subscribe, and we’ll alert you when each new ThreatsDay Bulletin is out.

A long-running Traffic Distribution System (TDS) known as Help TDS to a Russian-language affiliate program called Hotejka , which appears to be a rebrand of a traffic monetization operation dubbed ROI777. Help TDS is assessed to be active since at least 2017, offering PHP code templates to partners and affiliates that are installed into compromised websites with an aim to direct unsuspecting users to tech support scams. These scams make use of full-screen browser manipulation and exit prevention techniques to serve bogus Microsoft Windows security alert screens instructing victims to contact a Windows Support number to address the problem. "Help TDS delivers tech support scams (TSSs) that direct users to call centers, where social engineering is used to convince them to install remote desktop tools," Infoblox said in a report shared with The Hacker News. "It's not simple credit card fraud: it's remote access, living-off-the-land malware operations. Once in,...

Microsoft and Health-ISAC, along with the Japan Cybercrime Control Center (JC3) and a coalition of private sector companies, such as Resecurity, Cloudflare, Oracle, Proofpoint, and TRM Labs, announced the disruption of three phishing kits, CoGUI (aka NX or FA), Haozi (aka Phoenix), and Iron Man System . "Since January 2026, the threat actors behind these kits have been responsible for facilitating the sending of over one billion phishing emails and SMS messages to over 75 thousand organizations worldwide," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence and Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit said . The court-authorized operation is the result of an investigation that Microsoft launched in late 2025 after it was notified of malicious messaging campaigns targeting people in Japan. The  The Chinese-language cybercriminal ecosystem has been described as an interconnected network of phishing kit operators, developers, and an illicit marketplace and initial access broker (IAB) codenamed YAM ...

The U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) on Tuesday charged 14 people and seized about 187 computers and KVM devices as part of its ongoing efforts to disrupt North Korea's fraudulent remote IT worker (ITW) scheme . The indictment charges a mix of U.S. citizens and Chinese nationals for their roles in an IT worker conspiracy affecting more than 70 U.S. companies, charging them with wire fraud conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy, conspiracy to commit identity theft, and aggravated identity theft. The following individuals have been charged - Sun Sheng Ming, 37, Dandong City, China Pei Li Guang, age unknown, Liaoning, China Weng Shou Cheng, age unknown, Liaoning, China Han Guo Bin, age unknown, Dandong City, China Wang Jian Jun, 34, Dandong City, China Sheng Zhang Kun, age unknown, Shenzhen, China Zhang Wei Ping, age unknown, Dandong City, China Zhang Li Ping, age unknown, unknown location Yu Yang, 40, age unknown, Dandong City, China Jin Long, ...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Tuesday urged organizations to take steps to immediately update their Ivanti Connect Secure (ICS) appliances and deployments to the latest version following the disclosure of an actively exploited vulnerability. The security flaw, tracked as CVE-2026-104935 (CVSS score: 8.6), is a case of authentication bypass impacting ICS versions 25.1.1.1 and prior, 25.1.2.2 and prior, and 22.8R2.4 and prior that could allow a remote unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary commands. "CISA is aware of cyber threat actors exploiting this zero-day authentication bypass vulnerability, which allows remote, unauthenticated execution of arbitrary commands, to conduct credential theft and data exfiltration," the agency said .  The agency has since added the flaw to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, requiring Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies to apply the fixes by October 16, 2026. ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new Android banking trojan called Hirudo that works by replacing legitimate banking apps with purpose-built patched versions designed to bypass security checks from inside the app itself, marking a new escalation in financial fraud.  Dutch mobile security company ThreatFabric said it identified replacements for eight Indonesian banking apps, while credential targeting in the malware spans Indonesia, China, India, Mexico, Morocco and Thailand. "The operation combines credential theft, device takeover, screen and camera capture, and SMS theft, in combination with a fairly mature backend," Eward Driehuis, vice president of fraud engineering at ThreatFabric, said in a statement shared with The Hacker News. Hirudo facilitates on-device credential theft and live remote control. The malware is delivered by shopping, adult video, and entertainment dropper apps that carry the trojan as a separate installation package, whic...

Low-cost Android smartphones have been shipped with malicious software baked into the device firmware, allowing bad actors to covertly install apps, conduct ad fraud, and turn devices into residential proxies. The activity, which targets Android devices built on MediaTek platforms across several brands, is being tracked by Bitdefender under the moniker Midnight Mimosa . The preinstalled malware ("com.android.system.lite") runs with system-level privileges, which make it possible to install or uninstall a rotating set of at least 32 disguised apps, grant itself additional permissions to accessibility services, notifications, and SMS, and load arbitrary code supplied remotely by the operators. Specifically, it fetches a remote configuration from an external server and then downloads and executes additional payloads designed to conduct ad fraud and silent installation or removal of partner apps. These apps incorporate proxyware, ad fraud, and code execution features. It...

Cryptocurrency hardware maker Ledger has temporarily paused sales of its products via CryptoBilis following reports of stolen funds linked to devices sold by the reseller. On Friday, the company said it was investigating reports of loss of funds from users in Southeast Asia who had purchased products from CryptoBilis. The incident is said to have resulted in losses totaling more than $86 million, according to pseudonymous blockchain investigator Specter . "We recommend Ledger users who purchased from this reseller in the last 90 days to not initiate set up if you have not done so yet," Ledger said in an X post. "If you have set up your Ledger device, consider moving assets to a new Ledger signer (with new seed)." The company has since revealed that one of the impacted users' devices contained an unauthorized hardware implant, and that it's reaching out to impacted users as part of an ongoing probe into the incident. Out of an abundance of caution, ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a two-pronged artificial intelligence (AI)-augmented initial access campaign targeting WordPress sites, e-commerce platforms, and critical infrastructure entities in Ukraine. The activity, which brings together commodity offensive tools like Cobalt Strike with an AI orchestration layer powered by Anthropic's Claude Code, has been attributed to a Russian-speaking, financially motivated initial access broker codenamed CyberXero . The threat actor is assessed to be active since at least July 2026. "The operation runs two pipelines at once: a global, automated campaign against WordPress and e-commerce platforms, and a curated, manual campaign against Ukrainian energy and critical infrastructure," SOCRadar said in a report published last week. The global campaign specifically focuses on known security flaws like wp2shell (CVE-2026-63030 and CVE-2026-60137) and CVE-2026-4815 , an SQL injection vulnerability impactin...

The FBI has arrested another suspected co-conspirator of ShinyHunters, FBI Director Kash Patel said on October 9 in a  post on X . ShinyHunters is the extortion group that said in September it had  breached the FBI's jobs portal  and stolen sensitive data on almost all FBI agents and job applicants. The FBI has not named the suspect, and no charges have been made public. The suspect is a Canadian citizen who was arrested in Pennsylvania, according to  The New York Times  and  CBS News . Both cited unnamed sources. The Times reported that the arrest was made on suspicion of involvement in the theft of FBI data. A law enforcement source told CBS News that the suspect is believed to have been directly involved in the hack. An FBI spokesperson declined to comment on the Times report, CBS News said. Patel's post does not say whether the suspect took part in the breach. It calls ShinyHunters "the group believed to be responsible for the recent FBIjobs.g...

The crooks have trust problems of their own. One ransomware affiliate decided to keep the profits for himself. Elsewhere, an attacker left a server exposed, complete with tools and traces of an intrusion. Apparently, keeping things secure is a problem on both sides of the fence. The rest of the week isn't much more reassuring. Malicious code turned up in developer packages and extensions that looked harmless. Familiar online services helped phishing emails appear legitimate. A basic file upload flaw gave attackers a way in, while weak session cookies made impersonation far too easy. Even AI assistants are getting their own instructions hidden inside phishing messages now. What's interesting is the gap between effort and results. Some attacks involve several stages, careful timing, and plenty of tricks. Others get surprisingly far because of a bad design choice or something nobody bothered to check. Both seem to be working well enough. Anyway, here's what else turned u...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a targeted campaign aimed at South Korean financial organizations that used an artificial intelligence (AI) pen testing tool named ARTEX to carry out the attacks. The activity , per CrowdStrike Intelligence, was active from late September to early October 2026, and resulted in data exfiltration from various South Korea-based financial firms , including Shinhan Bank and Yegaram Savings Bank. "In this activity, the threat actor leveraged ARTEX, a recently released open-source agentic penetration testing (pentesting) tool developed in China, alongside large language models (LLMs)," the cybersecurity company said . CrowdStrike said it discovered the campaign after it identified a set of open directories hosted at a Hong Kong-based IP address, exposing Claude Code session histories, Claude memory files, and ARTEX configuration files. The campaign has not been attributed to any known threat actor or group. But evidenc...

Phishing kits are no longer limited to copying a familiar login page and waiting for a victim to enter credentials. Attackers are increasingly building filtering, session management, and traffic controls into the infrastructure that delivers the phishing page itself. ANY.RUN has identified Wazza, a new phishkit targeting banking, manufacturing, and government organizations across the US, Europe, and Australia. The campaign uses a multi-stage routing chain to screen visitors and automated traffic before delivering an Adobe-themed Device Code phishing page. For security teams, that makes Wazza more than another malicious URL. The campaign shows how attackers can control the path to the final lure, making the initial link less informative and potentially complicating automated detection. MSSPs face an added challenge, as they investigate alerts across multiple customer environments while keeping response times under control. That uncertainty can translate directly into longer in...

The U.S. State Department is offering up to $10 million for information leading to the identification or location of Zhang Yu, a Chinese national charged in the United States in connection with the 2021 Microsoft Exchange Server attacks known as HAFNIUM. The reward is for information leading to his identification or location, the news outlet  NTD reported  this week, citing a notice from the department's Rewards for Justice program. Zhang remains at large, U.S. authorities say, meaning he has not been arrested. The charges against him have not been tested in court. Rewards for Justice  is the State Department's national security rewards program. It says it has paid more than $250 million to over 125 people since 1984. Zhang is wanted for his alleged role in "malicious cyber activities against U.S. critical infrastructure," NTD quoted the notice as saying. The amount and that wording match an offer the program was already making  in January 2025 . That of...

The U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) on Wednesday announced charges against a 50-year-old U.S. and Israeli national for allegedly defrauding ransomware victims by secretly paying the attackers to obtain decryptors while claiming to use proprietary tools to recover their data. Zohar Pinhasi (aka Zack Silver and Zack Green) has been charged with two counts of wire fraud and one count of wire fraud conspiracy. If convicted, the defendant faces up to 20 years in prison for each count. "By falsely claiming to decrypt ransomware without paying off the ransomers, the defendant re-victimized his clients while extracting a hefty profit for himself," said U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella, Jr. for the Eastern District of New York. Pinhasi, who owned and operated a Florida company called MonsterCloud, is alleged to have made false representations to ransomware victims, urging them not to pay a ransom and claiming to have "proprietary tools" and "advanced decryption tec...

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Secret Service (USSS) on Tuesday warned that the FortiBleed credential harvesting campaign remains an active threat aimed at internet-facing Fortinet FortiGate firewalls and secure socket layer (SSL) virtual private network (VPN) gateways. "The campaign exploits reused or leaked credentials and legacy SHA-256 password storage, enabling threat actors to harvest and crack authentication data at scale," the agencies said . "Initial findings indicate attackers are continuing to scan internet-exposed Fortinet firewalls using previously obtained compromised credentials." FortiBleed was first documented by SOCRadar and Hudson Rock in June 2026, with the activity targeting thousands of Fortinet firewalls as part of a global campaign. In all, the Russian-speaking operation is estimated to have netted more than 86,644 working device credentials spanning 194 countries as of June 19, 2026. "The scale under discus...

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has removed an Accenture contractor for their alleged role in a ShinyHunters-breach that led to the theft of personal details of thousands of bureau employees. That's according to a report from Reuters, citing two sources familiar with the matter. "To date, our review has determined that the incident occurred as the result of a security failure ​of a platform managed by a third-party organization — after a contractor failed to implement a security patch explicitly issued to secure the ​platform," Brett Leatherman, assistant director of the FBI's cyber division, was quoted as saying to Reuters. "As such, the FBI has removed the contractor and taken all necessary steps to both mitigate any further risk and protect our workforce." Although the name of the third-party organization was not disclosed by the FBI, Reuters reported that it's Oracle PeopleSoft, which the ShinyHunters group said it exploited...

A suspected member of the ShinyHunters digital extortion group, who goes by the online alias "Rey," has been allegedly detained by authorities in Jordan, Reuters reported , citing three people familiar with the matter. Rey, whose real name is Saif ‌al-Din Khader, is said to have been brought into custody on September 29, 2026, and cooperating with the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and law enforcement to identify other members of the group. "His cooperation is critical to ongoing efforts to arrest these hackers," a source told the news agency. Rey, who also went by the online alias ReyXBF, is not an unknown face. In a report published in November 2025, independent security journalist Brian Krebs labeled him as one of the three administrators of Scattered LAPSUS$ Hunters (SLH or SLSH), a group that's assessed to be an amalgamation of Scattered Spider, LAPSUS$, and ShinyHunters. "Previously, Rey was an administrator of the data leak w...

Police in Spain have arrested a 16-year-old whom investigators suspect of running the KillSec ransomware group. KillSec is accused of stealing data from organizations and threatening to publish it on its leak site unless they paid. The 16-year-old was one of 3 people arrested on September 30, when police also took control of that site. Investigators identified him as KillSec's suspected administrator and main operator,  Hamburg police said  on October 1. Police and prosecutors in Hamburg, Germany, led the operation. The Guardia Civil and the Mossos d'Esquadra, both Spanish police forces, detained him in Alicante and searched a home and an office at a hotel in the province. Their joint statement,  carried by elperiodic.com , calls him one of the group's administrators and its presumed main administrator. The other 2 people arrested are in their 20s, one in the U.K. and one in Romania, a spokesperson for Europol, the European Union's police agency,  told Reute...