email security | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Cybersecurity researchers have detailed a new cluster of activity where threat actors are impersonating enterprises with fake Microsoft OAuth applications to facilitate credential harvesting as part of account takeover attacks. "The fake Microsoft 365 applications impersonate various companies, including RingCentral, SharePoint, Adobe, and Docusign," Proofpoint said in a Thursday report. The ongoing campaign, first detected in early 2025, is designed to use the OAuth applications as a gateway to obtain unauthorized access to users' Microsoft 365 accounts by means of phishing kits like Tycoon and ODx that are capable of conducting multi-factor authentication (MFA) phishing. The enterprise security company said it observed the approach being used in email campaigns with more than 50 impersonated applications. The attacks begin with phishing emails sent from compromised accounts and aim to trick recipients into clicking on URLs under the pretext of sharing requests ...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new phishing campaign that conceals malicious payloads by abusing link wrapping services from Proofpoint and Intermedia to bypass defenses. "Link wrapping is designed by vendors like Proofpoint to protect users by routing all clicked URLs through a scanning service, allowing them to block known malicious destinations at the moment of click," the Cloudflare Email Security team said . "While this is effective against known threats, attacks can still succeed if the wrapped link hasn't been flagged by the scanner at click time." The activity, observed over the last two months, once again illustrates how threat actors find different ways to leverage legitimate features and trusted tools to their advantage and perform malicious actions, in this case, redirecting victims to Microsoft 365 phishing pages. It's noteworthy that the abuse of link wrapping involves the attackers gaining unauthorized access to em...

The maintainers of the Python Package Index (PyPI) repository have issued a warning about an ongoing phishing attack that's targeting users in an attempt to redirect them to fake PyPI sites. The attack involves sending email messages bearing the subject line "[PyPI] Email verification" that are sent from the email address noreply@pypj[.]org (note that the domain is not " pypi[.]org "). "This is not a security breach of PyPI itself, but rather a phishing attempt that exploits the trust users have in PyPI," Mike Fiedler, PyPI Admin, said in a post Monday. The email messages instruct users to follow a link to verify their email address, which leads to a replica phishing site that impersonates PyPI and is designed to harvest their credentials. But in a clever twist, once the login information is entered on the bogus site, the request is routed to the legitimate PyPI site, effectively fooling the victims into thinking that nothing is amiss when, in r...

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Picture this: you've hardened every laptop in your fleet with real‑time telemetry, rapid isolation, and automated rollback. But the corporate mailbox—the front door for most attackers—is still guarded by what is effectively a 1990s-era filter. This isn't a balanced approach. Email remains a primary vector for breaches, yet we often treat it as a static stream of messages instead of a dynamic, post-delivery environment. This environment is rich with OAuth tokens, shared drive links, and years of sensitive data. The conversation needs to shift. We should stop asking, "Did the gateway block the bad thing?" and start asking, "How quickly can we see, contain, and undo the damage when an attacker inevitably gets in?" Looking at email security through this lens forces a fundamental shift toward the same assume-breach, detect-and-respond mindset that already revolutionized endpoint protection. The day the wall crumbled Most security professionals know the statisti...

Social engineering attacks have entered a new era—and they're coming fast, smart, and deeply personalized. It's no longer just suspicious emails in your spam folder. Today's attackers use generative AI, stolen branding assets, and deepfake tools to mimic your executives, hijack your social channels, and create convincing fakes of your website, emails, and even voice. They don't just spoof— they impersonate. Modern attackers aren't relying on chance. They're running long-term, multi-channel campaigns across email, LinkedIn, SMS, and even support portals—targeting your employees, customers, and partners. Whether it's a fake recruiter reaching out on LinkedIn, a lookalike login page sent via text, or a cloned CFO demanding a wire transfer, the tactics are faster, more adaptive, and increasingly automated using AI. The result? Even trained users are falling for sophisticated fakes—because they're not just phishing links anymore. They're operations. This Webinar Shows You How to Fight...

The 2025 Data Risk Report : Enterprises face potentially serious data loss risks from AI-fueled tools. Adopting a unified, AI-driven approach to data security can help. As businesses increasingly rely on cloud-driven platforms and AI-powered tools to accelerate digital transformation, the stakes for safeguarding sensitive enterprise data have reached unprecedented levels. The Zscaler ThreatLabz 2025 Data Risk Report reveals how evolving technology landscapes are amplifying vulnerabilities, highlighting the critical need for a proactive and unified approach to data protection. Drawing on insights from more than 1.2 billion blocked transactions recorded by the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange between February and December 2024, this year's report paints a clear picture of the data security challenges that enterprises face. From the rise of data leakage through generative AI tools to the undiminished risks stemming from email, SaaS applications, and file-sharing services, the findings are b...

Cybersecurity researchers are calling attention to phishing campaigns that impersonate popular brands and trick targets into calling phone numbers operated by threat actors. "A significant portion of email threats with PDF payloads persuade victims to call adversary-controlled phone numbers, displaying another popular social engineering technique known as Telephone-Oriented Attack Delivery (TOAD), also known as callback phishing," Cisco Talos researcher Omid Mirzaei said in a report shared with The Hacker News. An analysis of phishing emails with PDF attachments between May 5 and June 5, 2025, has revealed Microsoft and Docusign to be the most impersonated brands. NortonLifeLock, PayPal, and Geek Squad are among the most impersonated brands in TOAD emails with PDF attachments. The activity is part of wider phishing attacks that attempt to leverage the trust people have with popular brands to initiate malicious actions. These messages typically incorporate PDF attachments...

The Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) has warned of a new cyber attack campaign by the Russia-linked APT28 (aka UAC-0001) threat actors using Signal chat messages to deliver two previously undocumented malware families dubbedd BEARDSHELL and COVENANT. BEARDSHELL, per CERT-UA, is written in C++ and offers the ability to download and execute PowerShell scripts, as well as upload the results of the execution back to a remote server over the Icedrive API. The agency said it first observed BEARDSHELL, alongside a screenshot-taking tool named SLIMAGENT, as part of incident response efforts in March-April 2024 in a Windows computer. While there were no details available on how the infection took place at that time, the agency said it received threat intelligence from ESET more than a year later that detected evidence of unauthorized access to a "gov.ua" email account. The exact nature of the information shared was not disclosed, but it likely pertains to a...

Threat actors with suspected ties to Russia have been observed taking advantage of a Google account feature called application specific passwords (or app passwords) as part of a novel social engineering tactic designed to gain access to victims' emails. Details of the highly targeted campaign were disclosed by Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) and the Citizen Lab, stating the activity seeks to impersonate the U.S. Department of State.  "From at least April through early June 2025, this actor targeted prominent academics and critics of Russia, often using extensive rapport building and tailored lures to convince the target to set up application specific passwords (ASPs), GTIG researchers Gabby Roncone and Wesley Shields said . "Once the target shares the ASP passcode, the attackers establish persistent access to the victim's mailbox." The activity has been attributed by Google to a threat cluster it tracks as UNC6293, which it says is likely affiliate...

A new campaign is making use of Cloudflare Tunnel subdomains to host malicious payloads and deliver them via malicious attachments embedded in phishing emails. The ongoing campaign has been codenamed SERPENTINE#CLOUD by Securonix. It leverages "the Cloudflare Tunnel infrastructure and Python-based loaders to deliver memory-injected payloads through a chain of shortcut files and obfuscated scripts," security researcher Tim Peck said in a report shared with The Hacker News. The attack starts with sending payment- or invoice-themed phishing emails bearing a link to a zipped document that contains a Windows shortcut (LNK) file. These shortcuts are disguised as documents to trick victims into opening them, effectively activating the infection sequence. The elaborate multi-step process culminates in the execution of a Python-based shellcode loader that executes payloads packed with the open-source Donut loader entirely in memory. Securonix said the campaign has targeted the...

Cybersecurity researchers are warning of a new phishing campaign that's targeting users in Taiwan with malware families such as HoldingHands RAT and Gh0stCringe. The activity is part of a broader campaign that delivered the Winos 4.0 malware framework earlier this January by sending phishing messages impersonating Taiwan's National Taxation Bureau, Fortinet FortiGuard Labs said in a report shared with The Hacker News. The cybersecurity company said it identified additional malware samples through continuous monitoring and that it observed the same threat actor, referred to as Silver Fox APT, using malware-laced PDF documents or ZIP files distributed via phishing emails to deliver Gh0stCringe and a malware strain based on HoldingHands RAT. It's worth noting that both HoldingHands RAT (aka Gh0stBins) and Gh0stCringe are variants of a known remote access trojan called Gh0st RAT, which is widely used by Chinese hacking groups. The starting point of the attack is a p...

In today's cybersecurity landscape, much of the focus is placed on firewalls, antivirus software, and endpoint detection. While these tools are essential, one critical layer often goes overlooked: the Domain Name System (DNS). As the starting point of nearly every online interaction, DNS is not only foundational - it's increasingly a target. When left unsecured, it becomes a single point of failure that can disrupt services, redirect users, or expose sensitive data. Securing it isn't just good practice - it's a necessity. Why DNS Is a Core Part of Internet Infrastructure The Domain Name System, or DNS, functions like the internet's address book. It translates easy-to-remember domain names (like example.com ) into the numerical IP addresses (like 1.2.3.4 ) that computers use to identify each other across networks. Every time a user visits a website, opens an app, or sends an email, a DNS query is triggered in the background to connect that request to the correct server. Without DNS,...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a critical security flaw in the Roundcube webmail software that has gone unnoticed for a decade and could be exploited to take over susceptible systems and execute arbitrary code. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-49113 , carries a CVSS score of 9.9 out of 10.0. It has been described as a case of post-authenticated remote code execution via PHP object deserialization. "Roundcube Webmail before 1.5.10 and 1.6.x before 1.6.11 allows remote code execution by authenticated users because the _from parameter in a URL is not validated in program/actions/settings/upload.php, leading to PHP Object Deserialization," reads the description of the flaw in the NIST's National Vulnerability Database (NVD). The shortcoming, which affects all versions of the software before and including 1.6.10, has been addressed in 1.6.11 and 1.5.10 LTS . Kirill Firsov, founder and CEO of FearsOff, has been credited with discovering and repor...

Cybersecurity researchers have warned of a new spear-phishing campaign that uses a legitimate remote access tool called Netbird to target Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) and financial executives at banks, energy companies, insurers, and investment firms across Europe, Africa, Canada, the Middle East, and South Asia.  "In what appears to be a multi-stage phishing operation, the attackers aimed to deploy NetBird, a legitimate wireguard-based remote access tool on the victim's computer," Trellix researcher Srini Seethapathy said in an analysis. The activity, first detected by the cybersecurity company in mid-May 2025, has not been attributed to a known threat actor or group. The starting point of the attack is a phishing email that impersonates a recruiter from Rothschild & Co. and claims to offer a "strategic opportunity" with the company. The email is designed to entice the recipients into opening a purported PDF attachment that, in reality, is a phishin...

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed a new malicious campaign that uses a fake website advertising antivirus software from Bitdefender to dupe victims into downloading a remote access trojan called Venom RAT. The campaign indicates a "clear intent to target individuals for financial gain by compromising their credentials, crypto wallets, and potentially selling access to their systems," the DomainTools Intelligence (DTI) team said in a new report shared with The Hacker News. The website in question, "bitdefender-download[.]com," advertises site visitors to download a Windows version of the Antivirus software. Clicking on the prominent "Download for Windows" button initiates a file download from a Bitbucket repository that redirects to an Amazon S3 bucket. The Bitbucket account is no longer active. The ZIP archive ("BitDefender.zip") contains an executable called "StoreInstaller.exe," which includes malware configurations assoc...

Microsoft has shed light on a previously undocumented cluster of malicious activity originating from a Russia-affiliated threat actor dubbed Void Blizzard (aka Laundry Bear) that it said is attributed to "worldwide cloud abuse." Active since at least April 2024, the hacking group is linked to espionage operations mainly targeting organizations that are important to Russian government objectives, including those in government, defense, transportation, media, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and healthcare sectors in Europe and North America. "They often use stolen sign-in details that they likely buy from online marketplaces to gain access to organizations," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said in a report published today. "Once inside, they steal large amounts of emails and files." Attacks mounted by Void Blizzard have been found to disproportionately single out NATO member states and Ukraine, suggesting that the adversary is looking to ...