Microsoft | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

An unpatched security flaw impacting Microsoft Windows has been exploited by 11 state-sponsored groups from China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia as part of data theft, espionage, and financially motivated campaigns that date back to 2017. The zero-day vulnerability, tracked by Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) as ZDI-CAN-25373 , refers to an issue that allows bad actors to execute hidden malicious commands on a victim's machine by leveraging crafted Windows Shortcut or Shell Link (.LNK) files. "The attacks leverage hidden command line arguments within .LNK files to execute malicious payloads, complicating detection," security researchers Peter Girnus and Aliakbar Zahravi said in an analysis shared with The Hacker News. "The exploitation of ZDI-CAN-25373 exposes organizations to significant risks of data theft and cyber espionage." Specifically, this involves the padding of the arguments with Space (0x20), Horizontal Tab (0x09), Line Feed (0x0A),...

Microsoft is calling attention to a novel remote access trojan (RAT) named StilachiRAT that it said employs advanced techniques to sidestep detection and persist within target environments with an ultimate aim to steal sensitive data. The malware contains capabilities to "steal information from the target system, such as credentials stored in the browser, digital wallet information, data stored in the clipboard, as well as system information," the Microsoft Incident Response team said in an analysis. The tech giant said it discovered StilachiRAT in November 2024, with its RAT features present in a DLL module named "WWStartupCtrl64.dll." The malware has not been attributed to any specific threat actor or country. It's currently not clear how the malware is delivered to targets, but Microsoft noted that such trojans can be installed via various initial access routes, making it crucial for organizations to implement adequate security measures. StilachiRAT i...

The latest Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 Cloud Threat Report found that sensitive data is found in 66% of cloud storage buckets. This data is vulnerable to ransomware attacks. The SANS Institute recently reported that these attacks can be performed by abusing the cloud provider's storage security controls and default settings. "In just the past few months, I have witnessed two different methods for executing a ransomware attack using nothing but legitimate cloud security features," warns Brandon Evans, security consultant and SANS Certified Instructor. Halcyon disclosed an attack campaign that leveraged one of Amazon S3's native encryption mechanisms, SSE-C, to encrypt each of the target buckets. A few months prior, security consultant Chris Farris demonstrated how attackers could perform a similar attack using a different AWS security feature, KMS keys with external key material, using simple scripts generated by ChatGPT. "Clearly, this topic is top-of-mind for both threat actors and ...

Microsoft has shed light on an ongoing phishing campaign that has targeted the hospitality sector by impersonating online travel agency Booking.com using an increasingly popular social engineering technique called ClickFix to deliver credential-stealing malware. The activity, the tech giant's threat intelligence team said, started in December 2024 and operates with the end goal of conducting financial fraud and theft. It's tracking the campaign under the moniker Storm-1865 . "This phishing attack specifically targets individuals in hospitality organizations in North America, Oceania, South and Southeast Asia, and Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western Europe, that are most likely to work with Booking.com, sending fake emails purporting to be coming from the agency," Microsoft said in a report shared with The Hacker News. The ClickFix technique has become widespread in recent months, as it tricks users into executing malware under the guise of fixing a supposed...

Two high-severity security flaws have been disclosed in the open-source ruby-saml library that could allow malicious actors to bypass Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) authentication protections. SAML is an XML-based markup language and open-standard used for exchanging authentication and authorization data between parties, enabling features like single sign-on (SSO), which allows individuals to use a single set of credentials to access multiple sites, services, and apps. The vulnerabilities, tracked as CVE-2025-25291 and CVE-2025-25292 , carry a CVSS score of 8.8 out of 10.0. They affect the following versions of the library - < 1.12.4 >= 1.13.0, < 1.18.0 Both the shortcomings stem from how both REXML and Nokogiri parse XML differently, causing the two parsers to generate entirely different document structures from the same XML input This parser differential allows an attacker to be able to execute a Signature Wrapping attack, leading to an authentication by...

Microsoft on Tuesday released security updates to address 57 security vulnerabilities in its software, including a whopping six zero-days that it said have been actively exploited in the wild. Of the 56 flaws, six are rated Critical, 50 are rated Important, and one is rated Low in severity. Twenty-three of the addressed vulnerabilities are remote code execution bugs and 22 relate to privilege escalation. The updates are in addition to 17 vulnerabilities Microsoft addressed in its Chromium-based Edge browser since the release of last month's Patch Tuesday update , one of which is a spoofing flaw specific to the browser ( CVE-2025-26643 , CVSS score: 5.4). The six vulnerabilities that have come under active exploitation are listed below - CVE-2025-24983 (CVSS score: 7.0) - A Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem use-after-free (UAF) vulnerability that allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally CVE-2025-24984 (CVSS score: 4.6) - A Windows NTFS information disclosu...

Microsoft has disclosed details of a large-scale malvertising campaign that's estimated to have impacted over one million devices globally as part of what it said is an opportunistic attack designed to steal sensitive information. The tech giant, which detected the activity in early December 2024, is tracking it under the broader umbrella Storm-0408, a moniker used for a set of threat actors that are known to distribute remote access or information-stealing malware via phishing, search engine optimization (SEO), or malvertising. "The attack originated from illegal streaming websites embedded with malvertising redirectors, leading to an intermediary website where the user was then redirected to GitHub and two other platforms," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said . "The campaign impacted a wide range of organizations and industries, including both consumer and enterprise devices, highlighting the indiscriminate nature of the attack." The most signifi...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Monday added five security flaws impacting software from Cisco, Hitachi Vantara, Microsoft Windows, and Progress WhatsUp Gold to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, based on evidence of active exploitation. The list of vulnerabilities is as follows - CVE-2023-20118 (CVSS score: 6.5) - A command injection vulnerability in the web-based management interface of Cisco Small Business RV Series routers that allows an authenticated, remote attacker to gain root-level privileges and access unauthorized data (Unpatched due to the routers reaching end-of-life status) CVE-2022-43939 (CVSS score: 8.6) - An authorization bypass vulnerability in Hitachi Vantara Pentaho BA Server that stems from the use of non-canonical URL paths for authorization decisions (Fixed in August 2024 with versions 9.3.0.2 and 9.4.0.1) CVE-2022-43769 (CVSS score: 8.8) - A special element injection vulnerability in Hitachi Vantara...

Threat actors have been exploiting a security vulnerability in Paragon Partition Manager's BioNTdrv.sys driver in ransomware attacks to escalate privileges and execute arbitrary code. The zero-day flaw (CVE-2025-0289) is part of a set of five vulnerabilities that was discovered by Microsoft, according to the CERT Coordination Center (CERT/CC). "These include arbitrary kernel memory mapping and write vulnerabilities, a null pointer dereference, insecure kernel resource access, and an arbitrary memory move vulnerability," CERT/CC said . In a hypothetical attack scenario, an adversary with local access to a Windows machine can exploit these shortcomings to escalate privileges or cause a denial-of-service (DoS) condition by taking advantage of the fact that "BioNTdrv.sys" is signed by Microsoft. This could also pave the way for what's called a Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver ( BYOVD ) attack on systems where the driver is not installed, thereby allowing t...

Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) is an amazing technology developed by Microsoft that lets you access and control another computer over a network. It's like having your office computer with you wherever you go. For businesses, this means IT staff can manage systems remotely, and employees can work from home or anywhere, making RDP a true game-changer in today's work environment. But here's the catch: because RDP is accessible over the internet, it's also a prime target for unethical hackers. If someone gains unauthorized access, they could potentially take over your system. That's why it's so important to secure RDP properly. Why IT Teams Depend on RDP, Despite the Risks More than 50 percent of Kaseya's small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and Managed Service Providers (MSPs) customers use RDP for daily operations due to its efficiency and flexibility: Reduces Costs and Downtime – IT teams can resolve technical issues remotely, eliminating travel expenses and delays. Supports B...

Microsoft on Thursday unmasked four of the individuals that it said were behind an Azure Abuse Enterprise scheme that involves leveraging unauthorized access to generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) services in order to produce offensive and harmful content. The campaign, called LLMjacking, has targeted various AI offerings, including Microsoft's Azure OpenAI Service. The tech giant is tracking the cybercrime network as Storm-2139. The individuals named are - Arian Yadegarnia aka "Fiz" of Iran, Alan Krysiak aka "Drago" of United Kingdom, Ricky Yuen aka "cg-dot" of Hong Kong, China, and Phát Phùng Tấn aka "Asakuri" of Vietnam "Members of Storm-2139 exploited exposed customer credentials scraped from public sources to unlawfully access accounts with certain generative AI services," Steven Masada, assistant general counsel for Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit (DCU), said . "They then altered the capabilities of ...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Tuesday placed two security flaws impacting Microsoft Partner Center and Synacor Zimbra Collaboration Suite (ZCS) to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, based on evidence of active exploitation. The vulnerabilities in question are as follows - CVE-2024-49035 (CVSS score: 8.7) - An improper access control vulnerability in Microsoft Partner Center that allows an attacker to escalate privileges. (Fixed in November 2024 ) CVE-2023-34192 (CVSS score: 9.0) - A cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Synacor ZCS that allows a remote authenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code via a crafted script to the /h/autoSaveDraft function. (Fixed in July 2023 with version 8.8.15 Patch 40) Last year, Microsoft acknowledged that CVE-2024-49035 had been exploited in the wild, but did not reveal any additional details on how it was weaponized in real-world attacks. There are currently no public repor...

Microsoft has released security updates to address two Critical-rated flaws impacting Bing and Power Pages, including one that has come under active exploitation in the wild. The vulnerabilities are listed below - CVE-2025-21355 (CVSS score: 8.6) - Microsoft Bing Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2025-24989 (CVSS score: 8.2) - Microsoft Power Pages Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability "Missing Authentication for Critical Function in Microsoft Bing allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code over a network," the tech giant said in an advisory for CVE-2025-21355. No customer action is required. On the other hand, CVE-2025-24989 concerns a case of improper access control in Power Pages , a low-code platform for creating, hosting, and managing secure business websites, that an unauthorized attacker could exploit to elevate privileges over a network and bypass user registration control. Microsoft, which credited its own employee Raj Kumar for flagging the vul...

Microsoft said it has discovered a new variant of a known Apple macOS malware called XCSSET as part of limited attacks in the wild. "Its first known variant since 2022, this latest XCSSET malware features enhanced obfuscation methods, updated persistence mechanisms, and new infection strategies," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said in a post shared on X. "These enhanced features add to this malware family's previously known capabilities, like targeting digital wallets, collecting data from the Notes app, and exfiltrating system information and files." XCSSET is a sophisticated modular macOS malware that's known to target users by infecting Apple Xcode projects. It was first documented by Trend Micro in August 2020. Subsequent iterations of the malware have been found to adapt to compromise newer versions of macOS as well as Apple's own M1 chipsets. In mid-2021, the cybersecurity company noted that XCSSET had been updated to exfiltrate d...

Microsoft is calling attention to an emerging threat cluster it calls Storm-2372 that has been attributed to a new set of cyber attacks aimed at a variety of sectors since August 2024. The attacks have targeted government, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), information technology (IT) services and technology, defense, telecommunications, health, higher education, and energy/oil and gas sectors in Europe, North America, Africa, and the Middle East.  The threat actor, assessed with medium confidence to be aligned with Russian interests, victimology, and tradecraft, has been observed targeting users via messaging apps like WhatsApp, Signal, and Microsoft Teams by falsely claiming to be a prominent person relevant to the target in an attempt to build trust. "The attacks use a specific phishing technique called 'device code phishing' that tricks users to log into productivity apps while Storm-2372 actors capture the information from the log in (tokens) that they can us...