Pegasus | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

A Russian programmer accused of donating money to Ukraine had his Android device secretly implanted with spyware by the Federal Security Service (FSB) after he was detained earlier this year. The findings come as part of a collaborative investigation by First Department and the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab . "The spyware placed on his device allows the operator to track a target device's location, record phone calls, keystrokes, and read messages from encrypted messaging apps, among other capabilities," according to the report. In May 2024, Kirill Parubets was released from custody after a 15-day period in administrative detention by Russian authorities, during which time his phone, an Oukitel WP7 phone running Android 10, was confiscated from him. During this period, not only was he beaten to compel him into revealing his device password, he was also subjected to an "intense effort" to recruit him as an informant for the FSB, or else risk fac...

Legal documents released as part of an ongoing legal tussle between Meta's WhatsApp and NSO Group have revealed that the Israeli spyware vendor used multiple exploits targeting the messaging app to deliver Pegasus, including one even after it was sued by Meta for doing so. They also show that NSO Group repeatedly found ways to install the invasive surveillance tool on the target's devices as WhatsApp erected new defenses to counter the threat. In May 2019, WhatsApp said it blocked a sophisticated cyber attack that exploited its video calling system to deliver Pegasus malware surreptitiously. The attack leveraged a then zero-day flaw tracked as CVE-2019-3568 (CVSS score: 9.8), a critical buffer overflow bug in the voice call functionality. The documents now show that NSO Group "developed yet another installation vector (known as Erised) that also used WhatsApp servers to install Pegasus." The attack vector – a zero-click exploit that could compromise a victim...

Vulnerability Management (VM) has long been a cornerstone of organizational cybersecurity. Nearly as old as the discipline of cybersecurity itself, it aims to help organizations identify and address potential security issues before they become serious problems. Yet, in recent years, the limitations of this approach have become increasingly evident.  At its core, Vulnerability Management processes remain essential for identifying and addressing weaknesses. But as time marches on and attack avenues evolve, this approach is beginning to show its age. In a recent report, How to Grow Vulnerability Management into Exposure Management (Gartner, How to Grow Vulnerability Management Into Exposure Management, 8 November 2024, Mitchell Schneider Et Al.), we believe Gartner® addresses this point precisely and demonstrates how organizations can – and must – shift from a vulnerability-centric strategy to a broader Exposure Management (EM) framework. We feel it's more than a worthwhile read an...

Apple has filed a motion to "voluntarily" dismiss its lawsuit against commercial spyware vendor NSO Group, citing a shifting risk landscape that could lead to exposure of critical "threat intelligence" information. The development was first reported by The Washington Post on Friday. The iPhone maker said its efforts, coupled with those of others in the industry and national governments to tackle the rise of commercial spyware, have "substantially weakened" the defendants. "At the same time, unfortunately, other malicious actors have arisen in the commercial spyware industry," the company said. "It is because of this combination of factors that Apple now seeks voluntary dismissal of this case." "While Apple continues to believe in the merits of its claims, it has also determined that proceeding further with this case has the potential to put vital security information at risk." Apple originally filed the lawsuit again...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed that the LightSpy spyware recently identified as targeting Apple iOS users is in fact a previously undocumented macOS variant of the implant. The findings come from both Huntress Labs and ThreatFabric , which separately analyzed the artifacts associated with the cross-platform malware framework that likely possesses capabilities to infect Android, iOS, Windows, macOS, Linux, and routers from NETGEAR, Linksys, and ASUS. "The Threat actor group used two publicly available exploits ( CVE-2018-4233 ,  CVE-2018-4404 ) to deliver implants for macOS," ThreatFabric said in a report published last week. "Part of the CVE-2018-4404 exploit is likely borrowed from the Metasploit framework. macOS version 10 was targeted using those exploits." LightSpy was first publicly reported in 2020, although subsequent reports from Lookout and the Dutch mobile security firm have revealed possible connections between the spyware and an Android s...

A U.S. judge has ordered NSO Group to hand over its source code for  Pegasus  and other remote access trojans to Meta as part of the social media giant's ongoing litigation against the Israeli spyware vendor. The decision marks a major legal victory for Meta, which  filed the lawsuit  in October 2019 for using its infrastructure to  distribute the spyware  to approximately 1,400 mobile devices between April and May. This also  included  two dozen Indian activists and journalists. These attacks leveraged a then zero-day flaw in the instant messaging app ( CVE-2019-3568 , CVSS score: 9.8), a critical  buffer overflow bug  in the voice call functionality, to deliver Pegasus by merely placing a call, even in scenarios where the calls were left unanswered. In addition, the attack chain included steps to erase the incoming call information from the logs in an attempt to sidestep detection. Court documents released late last month show t...

The U.S. State Department said it's implementing a new policy that imposes visa restrictions on individuals who are linked to the illegal use of commercial spyware to surveil civil society members. "The  misuse of commercial spyware  threatens privacy and freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly, and association," Secretary of State Antony Blinken  said . "Such targeting has been linked to arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings in the most egregious of cases." The latest measures, underscoring continued efforts on part of the U.S. government to curtail the proliferation of surveillance tools, are designed to "promote accountability" for individuals involved in commercial spyware misuse. The new policy covers people who have used such tools to "unlawfully surveil, harass, suppress, or intimidate individuals," as well as those who stand to financially benefit from the misuse. It also includes the companie...

Cybersecurity researchers have identified a "lightweight method" called  iShutdown  for reliably identifying signs of spyware on Apple iOS devices, including notorious threats like NSO Group's  Pegasus , QuaDream's  Reign , and Intellexa's  Predator .  Kaspersky, which analyzed a set of iPhones that were compromised with Pegasus, said the infections left traces in a file named "Shutdown.log," a text-based system log file available on all iOS devices and which records every reboot event alongside its environment characteristics. "Compared to more time-consuming acquisition methods like forensic device imaging or a full iOS backup, retrieving the Shutdown.log file is rather straightforward," security researcher Maher Yamout  said . "The log file is stored in a sysdiagnose (sysdiag) archive." The Russian cybersecurity firm said it identified entries in the log file that recorded instances where "sticky" processes, such as ...

The  Operation Triangulation  spyware attacks targeting Apple iOS devices leveraged never-before-seen exploits that made it possible to even bypass pivotal hardware-based security protections erected by the company. Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky, which  discovered  the  campaign  at the beginning of 2023 after becoming one of the targets,  described  it as the "most sophisticated attack chain" it has ever observed to date. The campaign is believed to have been active since 2019. Operation Triangulation gets its name from the use of a fingerprinting technique called canvas fingerprinting to draw a yellow triangle on a pink background with Web Graphics Library ( WebGL ) in the device's memory. The exploitation activity involved the use of four zero-day flaws that were fashioned into a chain to obtain an unprecedented level of access and backdoor target devices running iOS versions up to iOS 16.2 with the ultimate goal of gathering ...

A new analysis of the sophisticated commercial spyware called Predator has revealed that its ability to persist between reboots is offered as an "add-on feature" and that it depends on the licensing options opted by a customer. "In 2021, Predator spyware couldn't survive a reboot on the infected Android system (it had it on iOS)," Cisco Talos researchers Mike Gentile, Asheer Malhotra, and Vitor Ventura  said  in a report shared with The Hacker News. "However, by April 2022, that capability was being offered to their customers." Predator is the product of a consortium called the Intellexa Alliance, which includes Cytrox (subsequently acquired by WiSpear), Nexa Technologies, and Senpai Technologies. Both Cytrox and Intellexa were  added  to the Entity List by the U.S. in July 2023 for "trafficking in cyber exploits used to gain access to information systems." The latest findings come more than six months after the cybersecurity vendor detai...

The iPhone belonging to Galina Timchenko, a prominent Russian journalist and critic of the government, was compromised with NSO Group's Pegasus spyware, a new collaborative investigation from  Access Now  and the  Citizen Lab  has revealed. The infiltration is said to have happened on or around February 10, 2023. Timchenko is the executive editor and owner of  Meduza , an independent news publication based in Latvia. It's currently not clear who deployed the malware on the device. The Washington Post  reported  that the Russian government is not a client of NSO Group, citing an unnamed person familiar with the company's operations. "During the infection her device was localized to the GMT+1 timezone, and she reports being in Berlin, Germany," the Citizen Lab said. "The day following the infection she was scheduled to attend a private meeting with other heads of Russian independent media exiled in Europe to discuss how to manage threats and censorsh...

Apple on Thursday released emergency security updates for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS to address two zero-day flaws that have been exploited in the wild to deliver NSO Group's Pegasus mercenary spyware. The issues are described as below - CVE-2023-41061  - A validation issue in Wallet that could result in arbitrary code execution when handling a maliciously crafted attachment. CVE-2023-41064  - A buffer overflow issue in the  Image I/O component  that could result in arbitrary code execution when processing a maliciously crafted image. While CVE-2023-41064 was found by the Citizen Lab at the University of Torontoʼs Munk School, CVE-2023-41061 was discovered internally by Apple, with "assistance" from the Citizen Lab. The updates are available for the following devices and operating systems - iOS 16.6.1 and iPadOS 16.6.1  - iPhone 8 and later, iPad Pro (all models), iPad Air 3rd generation and later, iPad 5th generation and later, and iPad mini 5t...

Security researchers have detailed the inner workings of the commercial Android spyware called Predator, which is marketed by the Israeli company Intellexa (previously Cytrox). Predator was  first documented  by Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) in May 2022 as part of attacks leveraging five different zero-day flaws in the Chrome web browser and Android. The spyware, which is delivered by means of another loader component known as Alien, is equipped to record audio from phone calls and VoIP-based apps as well as gather contacts and messages, including from Signal, WhatsApp, and Telegram. Its other functionalities allow it to hide applications and prevent applications from being executed upon rebooting the handset. "A deep dive into both spyware components indicates that Alien is more than just a loader for Predator and actively sets up the low-level capabilities needed for Predator to spy on its victims," Cisco Talos  said  in a technical report. Spyware lik...

Israeli spyware maker NSO Group deployed at least three novel "zero-click" exploits against iPhones in 2022 to infiltrate defenses erected by Apple and deploy Pegasus, according to the latest findings from Citizen Lab. "NSO Group customers widely deployed at least three iOS 15 and iOS 16 zero-click exploit chains against civil society targets around the world," the interdisciplinary laboratory based at the University of Toronto  said . NSO Group is the manufacturer of  Pegasus , a sophisticated cyber weapon that's capable of extracting sensitive information stored in a device – e.g., messages, locations, photos, and call logs, among others — in real-time. It's typically delivered to targeted iPhones using zero-click and/or zero-day exploits. While it has been pitched as a tool for law enforcement agencies to combat serious crimes such as child sexual abuse and terrorism, it has also been deployed illegally by authoritarian governments to spy on human rig...