Threat Intelligence | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new ClickFix campaign that abuses compromised legitimate sites to deliver a previously undocumented remote access trojan (RAT) called MIMICRAT (aka AstarionRAT). "The campaign demonstrates a high level of operational sophistication: compromised sites spanning multiple industries and geographies serve as delivery infrastructure, a multi-stage PowerShell chain performs ETW and AMSI bypass before dropping a Lua-scripted shellcode loader, and the final implant communicates over HTTPS on port 443 using HTTP profiles that resemble legitimate web analytics traffic," Elastic Security Labs said in a Friday report. According to the enterprise search and cybersecurity company, MIMICRAT is a custom C++ RAT with support for Windows token impersonation, SOCKS5 tunneling, and a set of 22 commands for comprehensive post-exploitation capabilities. The campaign was discovered earlier this month. It's also assessed to share tactic...

A 29-year-old Ukrainian national has been sentenced to five years in prison in the U.S. for his role in facilitating North Korea's fraudulent information technology (IT) worker scheme. In November 2025, Oleksandr "Alexander" Didenko pleaded guilty to wire fraud conspiracy and aggravated identity theft for stealing the identities of U.S. citizens and selling them to IT workers to help them land jobs at 40 U.S. companies and draw regular salaries, which were then funneled back to the regime to support its weapons programs. He was apprehended by Polish authorities in late 2024, and later extradited to the U.S. Didenko has also been ordered to serve 12 months of supervised release and to pay $46,547.28 in restitution. Last year, Didenko also agreed to forfeit more than $1.4 million, which includes about $181,438 in U.S. dollars and cryptocurrency seized from him and his co-conspirators. The defendant is said to have run a website named Upworksell[.]com to help oversea...

We’ve all seen this before: a developer deploys a new cloud workload and grants overly broad permissions just to keep the sprint moving. An engineer generates a "temporary" API key for testing and forgets to revoke it. In the past, these were minor operational risks, debts you’d eventually pay down during a slower cycle. In 2026, “Eventually” is Now But today, within minutes, AI-powered adversarial systems can find that over-permissioned workload, map its identity relationships, and calculate a viable route to your critical assets. Before your security team has even finished their morning coffee, AI agents have simulated thousands of attack sequences and moved toward execution. AI compresses reconnaissance, simulation, and prioritization into a single automated sequence. The exposure you created this morning can be modeled, validated, and positioned inside a viable attack path before your team has lunch. The Collapse of the Exploitation Window Historically, the exploita...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new Android trojan called Massiv that's designed to facilitate device takeover ( DTO ) attacks for financial theft. The malware, according to ThreatFabric, masquerades as seemingly harmless IPTV apps to deceive victims, indicating that the activity is primarily singling out users looking for the online TV applications. "This new threat, while only seen in a limited number of rather targeted campaigns, already poses a great risk to the users of mobile banking, allowing its operators to remotely control infected devices and perform device takeover attacks with further fraudulent transactions performed from the victim's banking accounts," the Dutch mobile security company said in a report shared with The Hacker News. ThreatFabric told The Hacker News via email that the malware was first spotted in a campaign targeting users in Portugal and Greece earlier this year, although it has observed samples dating back to...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new campaign dubbed CRESCENTHARVEST , likely targeting supporters of Iran's ongoing protests to conduct information theft and long-term espionage. The Acronis Threat Research Unit (TRU) said it observed the activity after January 9, with the attacks designed to deliver a malicious payload that serves as a remote access trojan (RAT) and information stealer to execute commands, log keystrokes, and exfiltrate sensitive data. It's currently not known if any of the attacks were successful. "The campaign exploits recent geopolitical developments to lure victims into opening malicious .LNK files disguised as protest-related images or videos," researchers Subhajeet Singha, Eliad Kimhy, and Darrel Virtusio said in a report published this week. "These files are bundled with authentic media and a Farsi-language report providing updates from 'the rebellious cities of Iran.' This pro- protest framing appears ...

New research from the Citizen Lab has found signs that Kenyan authorities used a commercial forensic extraction tool manufactured by Israeli company Cellebrite to break into a prominent dissident's phone, making it the latest case of abuse of the technology targeting civil society. The interdisciplinary research unit at the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy said it found the indicators on a personal phone belonging to Boniface Mwangi, a Kenyan pro-democracy activist who has announced plans to run for president in 2027. Specifically, it has emerged that Cellebrite's forensic extraction tools were used on his Samsung phone while it was in police custody following his arrest in July 2025. The phone was returned to him nearly two months later, in September, at which point Mwangi found that the phone was no longer password-protected and could be unlocked without requiring a password. It's been assessed with high confidence that ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed a critical security flaw in the Grandstream GXP1600 series of VoIP phones that could allow an attacker to seize control of susceptible devices. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-2329 , carries a CVSS score of 9.3 out of a maximum of 10.0. It has been described as a case of unauthenticated stack-based buffer overflow that could result in remote code execution. "A remote attacker can leverage CVE-2026-2329 to achieve unauthenticated remote code execution (RCE) with root privileges on a target device," Rapid7 researcher Stephen Fewer, who discovered and reported the bug on January 6, 2026, said . According to the cybersecurity company, the issue is rooted in the device's web-based API service ("/cgi-bin/api.values.get") and is accessible in a default configuration without requiring authentication. This endpoint is designed to fetch one or more configuration values from the phone, such as the firmware version number...

In 2025, navigating the digital seas still felt like a matter of direction. Organizations charted routes, watched the horizon, and adjusted course to reach safe harbors of resilience, trust, and compliance. In 2026, the seas are no longer calm between storms. Cybersecurity now unfolds in a state of  continuous atmospheric instability : AI-driven threats that adapt in real time, expanding digital ecosystems, fragile trust relationships, persistent regulatory pressure, and accelerating technological change. This is not turbulence on the way to stability; it  is the climate. In this environment, cybersecurity technologies are no longer merely navigational aids. They are  structural reinforcements . They determine whether an organization endures volatility or learns to function normally within it. That is why security investments in 2026 are increasingly made not for coverage, but for  operational continuity : sustained operations, decision-grade visibility and cont...

A maximum severity security vulnerability in Dell RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines has been exploited as a zero-day by a suspected China-nexus threat cluster dubbed UNC6201 since mid-2024, according to a new report from Google Mandiant and Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG). The activity involves the exploitation of CVE-2026-22769 (CVSS score: 10.0), a case of hard-coded credentials affecting versions prior to 6.0.3.1 HF1. Other products, including RecoverPoint Classic, are not vulnerable to the flaw. "This is considered critical as an unauthenticated remote attacker with knowledge of the hardcoded credential could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to unauthorized access to the underlying operating system and root-level persistence," Dell said in a bulletin released Tuesday. The issue impacts the following products - RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines Version 5.3 SP4 P1 - Migrate from RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines 5.3 SP4 P1 to 6.0 SP3, and th...

Security, IT, and engineering teams today are under relentless pressure to accelerate outcomes, cut operational drag, and unlock the full potential of AI and automation. But simply investing in tools isn’t enough. 88% of AI proofs-of-concept never make it to production, even though 70% of workers cite freeing time for high-value work as the primary AI automation motivation. Real impact comes from intelligent workflows that combine automation, AI-driven decisioning, and human ingenuity into seamless processes that work across teams and systems.  In this article, we’ll highlight three use cases across Security and IT that can serve as powerful starting points for your intelligent workflow program. For each use case, we’ll share a pre-built workflow to help you tackle real bottlenecks in your organization with automation while connecting directly into your existing tech stack. These use cases are great starting points to help you turn theory into practice and achieve measurable gai...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Tuesday added four security flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, citing evidence of active exploitation in the wild. The list of vulnerabilities is as follows - CVE-2026-2441 (CVSS score: 8.8) - A use-after-free vulnerability in Google Chrome that could allow a remote attacker to potentially exploit heap corruption via a crafted HTML page. CVE-2024-7694 (CVSS score: 7.2) - An arbitrary file upload vulnerability in TeamT5 ThreatSonar Anti-Ransomware versions 3.4.5 and earlier that could allow an attacker to upload malicious files and achieve arbitrary system command execution on the server. CVE-2020-7796 (CVSS score: 9.8) - A server-side request forgery (SSRF) vulnerability in Synacor Zimbra Collaboration Suite (ZCS) that could allow an attacker to send a crafted HTTP request to a remote host and obtain unauthorized access to sensitive information. CVE-2008-0015 (CVSS score: 8.8) - ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed that artificial intelligence (AI) assistants that support web browsing or URL fetching capabilities can be turned into stealthy command-and-control (C2) relays, a technique that could allow attackers to blend into legitimate enterprise communications and evade detection. The attack method, which has been demonstrated against Microsoft Copilot and xAI Grok, has been codenamed AI as a C2 proxy by Check Point. It leverages "anonymous web access combined with browsing and summarization prompts," the cybersecurity company said. "The same mechanism can also enable AI-assisted malware operations, including generating reconnaissance workflows, scripting attacker actions, and dynamically deciding 'what to do next' during an intrusion." The development signals yet another consequential evolution in how threat actors could abuse AI systems, not just to scale or accelerate different phases of the cyber attack cycle, but als...

A new Android backdoor that's embedded deep into the device firmware can silently harvest data and remotely control its behavior, according to new findings from Kaspersky. The Russian cybersecurity vendor said it discovered the backdoor, dubbed Keenadu , in the firmware of devices associated with various brands, including Alldocube, with the compromise occurring during the firmware build phase. Keenadu has been detected in Alldocube iPlay 50 mini Pro firmware dating back to August 18, 2023. In all cases, the backdoor is embedded within tablet firmware, and the firmware files carry valid digital signatures. The names of the other vendors were not disclosed. "In several instances, the compromised firmware was delivered with an OTA update," security researcher Dmitry Kalinin said in an exhaustive analysis published today. "A copy of the backdoor is loaded into the address space of every app upon launch. The malware is a multi-stage loader granting its operators the ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new SmartLoader campaign that involves distributing a trojanized version of a Model Context Protocol ( MCP ) server associated with Oura Health to deliver an information stealer known as StealC . "The threat actors cloned a legitimate Oura MCP Server – a tool that connects AI assistants to Oura Ring health data – and built a deceptive infrastructure of fake forks and contributors to manufacture credibility," Straiker's AI Research (STAR) Labs team said in a report shared with The Hacker News. The end game is to leverage the trojanized version of the Oura MCP server to deliver the StealC infostealer, allowing the threat actors to steal credentials, browser passwords, and data from cryptocurrency wallets. SmartLoader, first highlighted by OALABS Research in early 2024, is a malware loader that's known to be distributed via fake GitHub repositories containing artificial intelligence (AI)-generated lures to giv...

Cybersecurity researchers disclosed they have detected a case of an information stealer infection successfully exfiltrating a victim's OpenClaw (formerly Clawdbot and Moltbot ) configuration environment. "This finding marks a significant milestone in the evolution of infostealer behavior: the transition from stealing browser credentials to harvesting the 'souls' and identities of personal AI [artificial intelligence] agents," Hudson Rock said . Alon Gal, CTO of Hudson Rock, told The Hacker News that the stealer was likely a variant of Vidar based on the infection details. Vidar is an off-the-shelf information stealer that's known to be active since late 2018. That said, the cybersecurity company said the data capture was not facilitated by a custom OpenClaw module within the stealer malware, but rather through a "broad file-grabbing routine" that's designed to look for certain file extensions and specific directory names containing sensitiv...

Technologies are evolving fast, reshaping economies, governance, and daily life. Yet, as innovation accelerates, so do digital risks. Technological change is no longer abstract for such a country as Lithuania, as well. From e-signatures to digital health records, the country depends on secure systems.  Cybersecurity has become not only a technical challenge but a societal one – demanding the cooperation of scientists, business leaders, and policymakers. In Lithuania, this cooperation has taken a concrete form – the government-funded national initiative . Coordinated by the Innovation Agency Lithuania, the project aims to strengthen the country’s e-security and digital resilience.  Under this umbrella, universities and companies with long-standing expertise are working hand in hand to transform scientific knowledge into market-ready, high-value innovations. Several of these solutions are already being tested in real environments, for example, in public institutions and criti...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new mobile spyware platform dubbed ZeroDayRAT that's being advertised on Telegram as a way to grab sensitive data and facilitate real-time surveillance on Android and iOS devices. "The developer runs dedicated channels for sales, customer support, and regular updates, giving buyers a single point of access to a fully operational spyware panel," Daniel Kelley, security researcher at iVerify, said . "The platform goes beyond typical data collection into real-time surveillance and direct financial theft." ZeroDayRAT is designed to support Android versions 5 through 16 and iOS versions up to 26. It's assessed that the malware is distributed via social engineering or fake app marketplaces. The malicious binaries are generated through a builder that's provided to buyers along with an online panel that they can set up on their own server. Once the malware infects a device, the operator gets to see all ...

Google on Friday released security updates for its Chrome browser to address a security flaw that it said has been exploited in the wild. The high-severity vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-2441 (CVSS score: 8.8), has been described as a use-after-free bug in CSS. Security researcher Shaheen Fazim has been credited with discovering and reporting the shortcoming on February 11, 2026. "Use after free in CSS in Google Chrome prior to 145.0.7632.75 allowed a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code inside a sandbox via a crafted HTML page," according to a description of the flaw in the NIST's National Vulnerability Database (NVD). Google did not disclose any details about how the vulnerability is being exploited in the wild, by whom, or who may have been targeted, but it acknowledged that "an exploit for CVE-2026-2441 exists in the wild." While Google Chrome is no stranger to actively exploited vulnerabilities, the development once again highlights how bro...

Microsoft has disclosed details of a new version of the ClickFix social engineering tactic in which the attackers trick unsuspecting users into running commands that carry out a Domain Name System (DNS) lookup to retrieve the next-stage payload. Specifically, the attack relies on using the " nslookup " (short for nameserver lookup ) command to execute a custom DNS lookup triggered via the Windows Run dialog. ClickFix is an increasingly popular technique that's traditionally delivered via phishing, malvertising, or drive-by download schemes, often redirecting targets to bogus landing pages that host fake CAPTCHA verification or instructions to address a non-existent problem on their computers by running a command either through the Windows Run dialog or the macOS Terminal app. The attack method has become widespread over the past two years since it hinges on the victims infecting their own machines with malware, thereby allowing the threat actors to bypass security c...

A previously undocumented threat actor has been attributed to attacks targeting Ukrainian organizations with malware known as CANFAIL . Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) described the hacking group as possibly affiliated with Russian intelligence services. The threat actor is assessed to have targeted defense, military, government, and energy organizations within the Ukrainian regional and national governments. However, the group has also exhibited growing interest in aerospace organizations, manufacturing companies with military and drone ties, nuclear and chemical research organizations, and international organizations involved in conflict monitoring and humanitarian aid in Ukraine, GTIG added. "Despite being less sophisticated and resourced than other Russian threat groups, this actor recently began to overcome some technical limitations using LLMs [large language models]," GTIG said . "Through prompting, they conduct reconnaissance, create lures for soci...