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The Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) has warned that more than 2,000 computers in the country have been infected by a strain of malware called DirtyMoe. The agency  attributed  the campaign to a threat actor it calls  UAC-0027 . DirtyMoe , active since at least 2016, is capable of carrying out cryptojacking and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. In March 2022, cybersecurity firm Avast revealed the malware's ability to propagate in a worm-like fashion by taking advantage of known security flaws. The DDoS botnet is known to be delivered by means of another malware referred to as  Purple Fox  or via bogus MSI installer packages for popular software such as Telegram. Purple Fox is also  equipped with a rootkit  that allows the threat actors to  hide the malware  on the machine and make it difficult to detect and remove. The exact initial access vector used in the campaign targeting Ukraine is currently unknown. CERT-UA is recommending that organiza

A new variant of a remote access trojan called  Bandook  has been observed being propagated via phishing attacks with an aim to infiltrate Windows machines, underscoring the continuous evolution of the malware. Fortinet FortiGuard Labs, which identified the activity in October 2023, said the malware is distributed via a PDF file that embeds a link to a password-protected .7z archive. "After the victim extracts the malware with the password in the PDF file, the malware injects its payload into msinfo32.exe," security researcher Pei Han Liao  said . Bandook, first detected in 2007, is an  off-the-shelf malware  that comes with a wide range of features to remotely gain control of the infected systems. In July 2021, Slovak cybersecurity firm ESET  detailed  a cyber espionage campaign that leveraged an upgraded variant of Bandook to breach corporate networks in Spanish-speaking countries such as Venezuela. The starting point of the latest attack sequence is an injector component tha

Identities now transcend human boundaries. Within each line of code and every API call lies a non-human identity. These entities act as programmatic access keys, enabling authentication and facilitating interactions among systems and services, which are essential for every API call, database query, or storage account access. As we depend on multi-factor authentication and passwords to safeguard human identities, a pressing question arises: How do we guarantee the security and integrity of these non-human counterparts? How do we authenticate, authorize, and regulate access for entities devoid of life but crucial for the functioning of critical systems? Let's break it down. The challenge Imagine a cloud-native application as a bustling metropolis of tiny neighborhoods known as microservices, all neatly packed into containers. These microservices function akin to diligent worker bees, each diligently performing its designated task, be it processing data, verifying credentials, or

The Chinese-backed Hafnium hacking group has been linked to a piece of a new malware that's used to maintain persistence on compromised Windows environments. The threat actor is said to have targeted entities in the telecommunication, internet service provider and data services sectors from August 2021 to February 2022, expanding from the initial victimology patterns observed during its attacks exploiting the then zero-day flaws in  Microsoft Exchange Servers  in March 2021. Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC), which dubbed the defense evasion malware " Tarrask ," characterized it as a tool that creates "hidden" scheduled tasks on the system. "Scheduled task abuse is a very common method of persistence and defense evasion — and an enticing one, at that," the researchers  said . Hafnium, while most notable for Exchange Server attacks, has since leveraged unpatched zero-day vulnerabilities as initial vectors to drop web shells and other mal

Cybersecurity researchers have decoded the mechanism by which the versatile Qakbot banking trojan handles the insertion of encrypted configuration data into the  Windows Registry . Qakbot, also known as QBot, QuackBot and Pinkslipbot, has been  observed   in the wild  since 2007. Although mainly fashioned as an information-stealing malware, Qakbot has since shifted its goals and acquired new functionality to deliver post-compromise attack platforms such as Cobalt Strike Beacon, with the final objective of loading ransomware on infected machines. "It has been continually developed, with new capabilities introduced such as lateral movement, the ability to exfiltrate email and browser data, and to install additional malware," Trustwave researchers Lloyd Macrohon and Rodel Mendrez said in a report shared with The Hacker News. In recent months, phishing campaigns have culminated in the distribution of a  new loader  called  SQUIRRELWAFFLE , which acts as a channel to retrieve

Two days ago, Microsoft encountered a rapidly spreading cryptocurrency-mining malware that infected almost 500,000 computers within just 12 hours and successfully blocked it to a large extent. Dubbed Dofoil , aka Smoke Loader , the malware was found dropping a cryptocurrency miner program as payload on infected Windows computers that mines Electroneum coins, yet another cryptocurrency, for attackers using victims' CPUs. On March 6, Windows Defender suddenly detected more than 80,000 instances of several variants of Dofoil that raised the alarm at Microsoft Windows Defender research department, and within the next 12 hours, over 400,000 instances were recorded. The research team found that all these instances, rapidly spreading across Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine, were carrying a digital coin-mining payload, which masqueraded as a legitimate Windows binary to evade detection. However, Microsoft has not mentioned how these instances were delivered to such a massive audienc

Yesterday we reported you that Microsoft is auto-downloading Windows 10 installation files — between 3.5GB and 6GB — onto users' PCs even if they have not opted into the upgrade. Microsoft plans to deploy Windows 10 on over 1 Billion devices worldwide, and this auto-downloading Windows 10 could be one of its many strategies to achieve its goal. The company has dropped and saved a hidden $Windows.~BT folder on your PC's main drive (C drive), if you are running Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 . The bottom line is: Many Windows users are on limited or metered Internet connections. As Microsoft is not only consuming storage space but also using user's Internet bandwidth for large unrequested files, as the Windows 10 installer downloads up to 6 gigabytes. So, here are some methods that you can use to stop Microsoft from automatically downloading Windows 10 installation files. Method 1 This method is applicable for both Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 us

Malware is nothing but a malicious files which is stored on an infected computer system in order to damage the system or steal sensitive data from it or perform other malicious activities. But security researchers have uncovered a new and sophisticated piece of malware that infects systems and steals data without installing any file onto the targeted system. Researchers dubbed this  persistent malware as Poweliks , which resides in the computer registry only and is therefore not easily detectable as other typical malware that installs files on the affected system which can be scanned by antivirus or anti-malware Software. According to Paul Rascagneres , Senior Threat Researcher, Malware analyst at GData software, due to the malware's subsequent and step-after-step execution of code, the feature set was similar to a stacking principles of Matryoshka Doll approach. Paul has made a number of name ripping malware and bots to uncover and undermine cyber crimes. He won last

Japanese police had arrested three people, accused them of making death threats via email and discussion forums. However, later Researchers at Symantec have determined that a piece of malware was making death and bomb threats online on behalf of its victims infected. Symantec  confirmed that the malware " Backdoor.Rabasheeta " is capable of controlling a compromised computer from a remote location and the creator has the capability to command the malware to make the threats like bomb and murders. The most curious thing about this particular dropper is that it comes with a graphical user interface (GUI). The dropper for Backdoor.Rabasheeta drops a main module and a configuration file. The dropper creates a registry entry so that the main module is executed whenever the compromised computer starts. This dropper also modifies CreationTime, LastWriteTime, and LastAccessTime of the main module with random values to help keep it hidden. Then the dropper will execute the main mod