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A maximum-severity security flaw in a WordPress plugin called Modular DS has come under active exploitation in the wild, according to Patchstack. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-23550 (CVSS score: 10.0), has been described as a case of unauthenticated privilege escalation impacting all versions of the plugin prior to and including 2.5.1. It has been patched in version 2.5.2 . The plugin has more than 40,000 active installs. "In versions 2.5.1 and below, the plugin is vulnerable to privilege escalation, due to a combination of factors including direct route selection, bypassing of authentication mechanisms, and auto-login as admin," Patchstack said . The problem is rooted in its routing mechanism, which is designed to put certain sensitive routes behind an authentication barrier. The plugin exposes its routes under the "/api/modular-connector/" prefix. However, it has been found that this security layer can be bypassed every time the "direct reques...

As AI copilots and assistants become embedded in daily work, security teams are still focused on protecting the models themselves. But recent incidents suggest the bigger risk lies elsewhere: in the workflows that surround those models. Two Chrome extensions posing as AI helpers were recently caught stealing ChatGPT and DeepSeek chat data from over 900,000 users. Separately, researchers demonstrated how prompt injections hidden in code repositories could trick IBM's AI coding assistant into executing malware on a developer's machine. Neither attack broke the AI algorithms themselves.  They exploited the context in which the AI operates. That's the pattern worth paying attention to. When AI systems are embedded in real business processes, summarizing documents, drafting emails, and pulling data from internal tools, securing the model alone isn't enough. The workflow itself becomes the target. AI Models Are Becoming Workflow Engines To understand why this matters,...

Palo Alto Networks has released security updates for a high-severity security flaw impacting GlobalProtect Gateway and Portal, for which it said there exists a proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2026-0227 (CVSS score: 7.7), has been described as a denial-of-service (DoS) condition impacting GlobalProtect PAN-OS software arising as a result of an improper check for exceptional conditions ( CWE-754 ) "A vulnerability in Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS software enables an unauthenticated attacker to cause a denial-of-service (DoS) to the firewall," the company said in an advisory released Wednesday. "Repeated attempts to trigger this issue result in the firewall entering into maintenance mode." The issue, discovered and reported by an unnamed external researcher, affects the following versions - PAN-OS 12.1 < 12.1.3-h3, < 12.1.4 PAN-OS 11.2 < 11.2.4-h15, < 11.2.7-h8, < 11.2.10-h2 PAN-OS 11.1 < 11.1.4-h27, < 11.1.6...

The Black Lotus Labs team at Lumen Technologies said it null-routed traffic to more than 550 command-and-control (C2) nodes associated with the AISURU/Kimwolf botnet since early October 2025. AISURU and its Android counterpart, Kimwolf, have emerged as some of the biggest botnets in recent times, capable of directing enslaved devices to participate in distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and relay malicious traffic for residential proxy services . Details about Kimwolf emerged last month when QiAnXin XLab published an exhaustive analysis of the malware, which turns compromised devices – mostly unsanctioned Android TV streaming devices – into a residential proxy by delivering a software development kit (SDK) called ByteConnect either directly or through sketchy apps that come pre-installed on them. The net result is that the botnet has expanded to infect more than 2 million Android devices with an exposed Android Debug Bridge (ADB) service by tunneling through residentia...

Security experts have disclosed details of an active malware campaign that's exploiting a DLL side-loading vulnerability in a legitimate binary associated with the open-source c-ares library to bypass security controls and deliver a wide range of commodity trojans and stealers. "Attackers achieve evasion by pairing a malicious libcares-2.dll with any signed version of the legitimate ahost.exe (which they often rename) to execute their code," Trellix said in a report shared with The Hacker News. "This DLL side-loading technique allows the malware to bypass traditional signature-based security defenses." The campaign has been observed distributing a wide assortment of malware, such as Agent Tesla , CryptBot , Formbook , Lumma Stealer , Vidar Stealer , Remcos RAT , Quasar RAT , DCRat , and XWorm . Targets of the malicious activity include employees in finance, procurement, supply chain, and administration roles within commercial and industrial sectors like ...

Microsoft on Tuesday rolled out its first security update for 2026 , addressing 114 security flaws, including one vulnerability that it said has been actively exploited in the wild. Of the 114 flaws, eight are rated Critical, and 106 are rated Important in severity. As many as 58 vulnerabilities have been classified as privilege escalation, followed by 22 information disclosure, 21 remote code execution, and five spoofing flaws. According to data collected by Fortra, the update marks the third-largest January Patch Tuesday after January 2025 and January 2022. These patches are in addition to two security flaws that Microsoft has addressed in its Edge browser since the release of the December 2025 Patch Tuesday update, including a spoofing flaw in its Android app ( CVE-2025-65046 , 3.1) and a case of insufficient policy enforcement in Chromium's WebView tag ( CVE-2026-0628 , CVSS score: 8.8). The vulnerability that has come under in-the-wild exploitation is CVE-2026-20805 (CV...

The Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) has disclosed details of new cyber attacks targeting its defense forces with malware known as PLUGGYAPE between October and December 2025. The activity has been attributed with medium confidence to a Russian hacking group tracked as Void Blizzard (aka Laundry Bear or UAC-0190). The threat actor is believed to be active since at least April 2024. Attack chains distributing the malware leverage instant messaging Signal and WhatsApp as vectors, with the threat actors masquerading as charity organizations to convince targets into clicking on a seemingly-harmless link ("harthulp-ua[.]com" or "solidarity-help[.]org") impersonating the foundation and download a password-protected archive.

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a malicious Google Chrome extension that's capable of stealing API keys associated with MEXC, a centralized cryptocurrency exchange (CEX) available in over 170 countries , while masquerading as a tool to automate trading on the platform. The extension, named MEXC API Automator (ID: pppdfgkfdemgfknfnhpkibbkabhghhfh), has 29 downloads and is still available on the Chrome Web Store as of writing. It was first published on September 1, 2025, by a developer named "jorjortan142." "The extension programmatically creates new MEXC API keys, enables withdrawal permissions, hides that permission in the user interface (UI), and exfiltrates the resulting API key and secret to a hardcoded Telegram bot controlled by the threat actor," Socket security researcher Kirill Boychenko said in an analysis. According to the Chrome Web Store listing, the web browser add-on is described as an extension that "simplifies connecti...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a previously undocumented and feature-rich malware framework codenamed VoidLink that's specifically designed for long-term, stealthy access to Linux-based cloud environments According to a new report from Check Point Research, the cloud-native Linux malware framework comprises an array of custom loaders, implants, rootkits, and modular plugins that enable its operators to augment or change its capabilities over time, as well as pivot when objectives change. It was first discovered in December 2025. "The framework includes multiple cloud-focused capabilities and modules, and is engineered to operate reliably in cloud and container environments over extended periods," the cybersecurity company said in an analysis published today. "VoidLink's architecture is extremely flexible and highly modular, centered around a custom Plugin API that appears to be inspired by Cobalt Strike's Beacon Object Files (BOF) appr...

Old Playbook, New Scale: While defenders are chasing trends, attackers are optimizing the basics The security industry loves talking about "new" threats. AI-powered attacks. Quantum-resistant encryption. Zero-trust architectures. But looking around, it seems like the most effective attacks in 2025 are pretty much the same as they were in 2015. Attackers are exploiting the same entry points that worked - they're just doing it better. Supply Chain: Still Cascading Downstream As the Shai Hulud NPM campaign showed us, supply chain remains a major issue. A single compromised package can cascade through an entire dependency tree, affecting thousands of downstream projects. The attack vector hasn't changed. What's changed is how efficiently attackers can identify and exploit opportunities. AI has collapsed the barrier to entry. Just as AI has enabled one-person software projects to build sophisticated applications, the same is true in cybercrime. What used to requi...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has warned of active exploitation of a high-severity security flaw impacting Gogs by adding it to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-8110 (CVSS score: 8.7), relates to a case of path traversal in the repository file editor that could result in code execution. "Gogs Path Traversal Vulnerability: Gogs contains a path traversal vulnerability affecting improper Symbolic link handling in the PutContents API that could allow for code execution," CISA said in an advisory. Details of the shortcoming came to light last month when Wiz said it discovered it being exploited in zero-day attacks. The vulnerability essentially bypasses protections put in place for CVE-2024-55947 to achieve code execution by creating a git repository, committing a symbolic link pointing to a sensitive target, and using the PutContents API to write data to the symlink. This, in t...

A new wave of GoBruteforcer attacks has targeted databases of cryptocurrency and blockchain projects to co-opt them into a botnet that's capable of brute-forcing user passwords for services such as FTP, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and phpMyAdmin on Linux servers. "The current wave of campaigns is driven by two factors: the mass reuse of AI-generated server deployment examples that propagate common usernames and weak defaults, and the persistence of legacy web stacks such as XAMPP that expose FTP and admin interfaces with minimal hardening," Check Point Research said in an analysis published last week. GoBruteforcer, also called GoBrut, was first documented by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 in March 2023, documenting its ability to target Unix-like platforms running x86, x64, and ARM architectures to deploy an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) bot and a web shell for remote access, along with fetching a brute-force module to scan for vulnerable systems and expand the botnet's reach. ...

The Iranian threat actor known as MuddyWater has been attributed to a spear-phishing campaign targeting diplomatic, maritime, financial, and telecom entities in the Middle East with a Rust-based implant codenamed RustyWater . "The campaign uses icon spoofing and malicious Word documents to deliver Rust based implants capable of asynchronous C2, anti-analysis, registry persistence, and modular post-compromise capability expansion," CloudSEK resetter Prajwal Awasthi said in a report published this week. The latest development reflects continued evolution of MuddyWater's tradecraft, which has gradually-but-steadily reduced its reliance on legitimate remote access software as a post-exploitation tool in favor of a diverse custom malware arsenal comprising tools like Phoenix, UDPGangster , BugSleep (aka MuddyRot), and MuddyViper . Also tracked as Mango Sandstorm, Static Kitten, and TA450, the hacking group is assessed to be affiliated with Iran's Ministry of Intelli...

Chinese-speaking threat actors are suspected to have leveraged a compromised SonicWall VPN appliance as an initial access vector to deploy a VMware ESXi exploit that may have been developed as far back as February 2024. Cybersecurity firm Huntress, which observed the activity in December 2025 and stopped it before it could progress to the final stage, said it may have resulted in a ransomware attack. Most notably, the attack is believed to have exploited three VMware vulnerabilities that were disclosed as zero-days by Broadcom in March 2025: CVE-2025-22224 (CVSS score: 9.3), CVE-2025-22225 (CVSS score: 8.2), and CVE-2025-22226 (CVSS score: 7.1). Successful exploitation of the issue could permit a malicious actor with admin privileges to leak memory from the Virtual Machine Executable (VMX) process or execute code as the VMX process. That same month, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) added the flaws to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) ca...

Russian state-sponsored threat actors have been linked to a fresh set of credential harvesting attacks targeting individuals associated with a Turkish energy and nuclear research agency, as well as staff affiliated with a European think tank and organizations in North Macedonia and Uzbekistan. The activity has been attributed to APT28 (aka BlueDelta), which was tied to a "sustained" credential-harvesting campaign targeting users of UKR[.]net last month. APT28 is associated with the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (GRU). "The use of Turkish-language and regionally targeted lure material suggests that BlueDelta tailored its content to increase credibility among specific professional and geographic audiences," Recorded Future's Insikt Group said . "These selections reflect a continued interest in organizations connected to energy research, defense cooperation, and government communication networks relevan...

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on Thursday released an advisory warning of North Korean state-sponsored threat actors leveraging malicious QR codes in spear-phishing campaigns targeting entities in the country. "As of 2025, Kimsuky actors have targeted think tanks, academic institutions, and both U.S. and foreign government entities with embedded malicious Quick Response (QR) codes in spear-phishing campaigns," the FBI said in the flash alert. "This type of spear-phishing attack is referred to as quishing." The use of QR codes for phishing is a tactic that forces victims to shift from a machine that's secured by enterprise policies to a mobile device that may not offer the same level of protection, effectively allowing threat actors to bypass traditional defenses. Kimsuky, also tracked as APT43, Black Banshee, Emerald Sleet, Springtail, TA427, and Velvet Chollima, is a threat group that's assessed to be affiliated with North Korea's...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new campaign that uses WhatsApp as a distribution vector for a Windows banking trojan called Astaroth in attacks targeting Brazil. The campaign has been codenamed Boto Cor-de-Rosa by Acronis Threat Research Unit. "The malware retrieves the victim's WhatsApp contact list and automatically sends malicious messages to each contact to further spread the infection," the cybersecurity company said in a report shared with The Hacker News. "While the core Astaroth payload remains written in Delphi and its installer relies on Visual Basic script, the newly added WhatsApp-based worm module is implemented entirely in Python, highlighting the threat actors' growing use of multi-language modular components." Astaroth, also called Guildma, is a banking malware that has been detected in the wild since 2015, primarily targeting users in Latin America, notably Brazil, to facilitate data theft. In 2024, two diffe...

A China-nexus threat actor known as UAT-7290 has been attributed to espionage-focused intrusions against entities in South Asia and Southeastern Europe. The activity cluster, which has been active since at least 2022, primarily focuses on extensive technical reconnaissance of target organizations before initiating attacks, ultimately leading to the deployment of malware families such as RushDrop, DriveSwitch, and SilentRaid, according to a Cisco Talos report published today. "In addition to conducting espionage-focused attacks where UAT-7290 burrows deep inside a victim enterprise's network infrastructure, their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and tooling suggest that this actor also establishes Operational Relay Box (ORBs) nodes," researchers Asheer Malhotra, Vitor Ventura, and Brandon White said . "The ORB infrastructure may then be used by other China-nexus actors in their malicious operations, signifying UAT-7290's dual role as an espionage-motiva...

A cybercrime gang known as Black Cat has been attributed to a search engine optimization (SEO) poisoning campaign that employs fraudulent sites advertising popular software to trick users into downloading a backdoor capable of stealing sensitive data. According to a report published by the National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team/Coordination Center of China (CNCERT/CC) and Beijing Weibu Online (aka ThreatBook), the activity is designed to strategically push bogus sites to the top of search results on search engines like Microsoft Bing, specifically targeting users looking for programs like Google Chrome, Notepad++, QQ International, and iTools. "After visiting these high-ranking phishing pages, users are lured by carefully constructed download pages, attempting to download software installation packages bundled with malicious programs," CNCERT/CC and ThreatBook said. "Once installed, the program implants a backdoor Trojan without the user's k...

Threat actors engaging in phishing attacks are exploiting routing scenarios and misconfigured spoof protections to impersonate organizations' domains and distribute emails that appear as if they have been sent internally. "Threat actors have leveraged this vector to deliver a wide variety of phishing messages related to various phishing-as-a-service (PhaaS) platforms such as Tycoon 2FA ," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said in a Tuesday report. "These include messages with lures themed around voicemails, shared documents, communications from human resources (HR) departments, password resets or expirations, and others, leading to credential phishing." While the attack vector is not necessarily new , the tech giant said it has witnessed a surge in the use of the tactic since May 2025 as part of opportunistic campaigns targeting a wide variety of organizations across multiple industries and verticals. This includes a campaign that has employed spoofed e...