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Microsoft is warning of several phishing campaigns that are leveraging tax-related themes to deploy malware and steal credentials. "These campaigns notably use redirection methods such as URL shorteners and QR codes contained in malicious attachments and abuse legitimate services like file-hosting services and business profile pages to avoid detection," Microsoft said in a report shared with The Hacker News. A notable aspect of these campaigns is that they lead to phishing pages that are delivered via a phishing-as-a-service (PhaaS) platform codenamed RaccoonO365 , an e-crime platform that first came to light in early December 2024. Also delivered are remote access trojans (RATs) like Remcos RAT, as well as other malware and post-exploitation frameworks such as Latrodectus , AHKBot, GuLoader , and BruteRatel C4 (BRc4). One such campaign spotted by the tech giant on February 6, 2025, is estimated to have sent hundreds of emails targeting the United States ahead of the t...

Cybersecurity researchers have discovered a new variant of an Android banking trojan called HOOK that features ransomware-style overlay screens to display extortion messages. "A prominent characteristic of the latest variant is its capacity to deploy a full-screen ransomware overlay, which aims to coerce the victim into remitting a ransom payment," Zimperium zLabs researcher Vishnu Pratapagiri said . "This overlay presents an alarming '*WARNING*' message, alongside a wallet address and amount, both of which are dynamically retrieved from the command-and-control server." The mobile security company said the overlay is remotely initiated when the command "ransome" is issued by the C2 server. The overlay can be dismissed by the attacker by sending the "delete_ransome" command. HOOK is assessed to be an offshoot of the ERMAC banking trojan, which, coincidentally, had its source code leaked on a publicly accessible directory over the int...

The cyber espionage group known as Bahamut has been attributed as behind a highly targeted campaign that infects users of Android devices with malicious apps designed to extract sensitive information. The activity, which has been active since January 2022, entails distributing rogue VPN apps through a fake SecureVPN website set up for this purpose, Slovak cybersecurity firm ESET  said  in a new report shared with The Hacker News. At least eight different variants of the spyware apps have been discovered to date, with them being trojanized versions of legitimate VPN apps like SoftVPN and OpenVPN . None of these apps are available on Google Play Store. The tampered apps and their updates are pushed to users through the fraudulent website. It's also suspected that the targets are carefully selected, since launching the app requires the victim to enter an activation key to enable the features. This implies the use of an undetermined distribution vector, although past evide...

Microsoft said it has discovered a new variant of a known Apple macOS malware called XCSSET as part of limited attacks in the wild. "Its first known variant since 2022, this latest XCSSET malware features enhanced obfuscation methods, updated persistence mechanisms, and new infection strategies," the Microsoft Threat Intelligence team said in a post shared on X. "These enhanced features add to this malware family's previously known capabilities, like targeting digital wallets, collecting data from the Notes app, and exfiltrating system information and files." XCSSET is a sophisticated modular macOS malware that's known to target users by infecting Apple Xcode projects. It was first documented by Trend Micro in August 2020. Subsequent iterations of the malware have been found to adapt to compromise newer versions of macOS as well as Apple's own M1 chipsets. In mid-2021, the cybersecurity company noted that XCSSET had been updated to exfiltrate d...

The financially motivated threat actor known as EncryptHub (aka LARVA-208 and Water Gamayun) has been attributed to a new campaign that's targeting Web3 developers to infect them with information stealer malware. "LARVA-208 has evolved its tactics, using fake AI platforms (e.g., Norlax AI, mimicking Teampilot) to lure victims with job offers or portfolio review requests," Swiss cybersecurity company PRODAFT said in a statement shared with The Hacker News. While the group has a history of deploying ransomware, the latest findings demonstrate an evolution of its tactics and a diversification of its monetization methods by using stealer malware to harvest data from cryptocurrency wallets. EncryptHub's focus on Web3 developers isn't random—these individuals often manage crypto wallets, access to smart contract repositories, or sensitive test environments. Many operate as freelancers or work across multiple decentralized projects, making them harder to protect wit...

A DarkGate malware campaign observed in mid-January 2024 leveraged a recently patched security flaw in Microsoft Windows as a zero-day using bogus software installers. "During this campaign, users were lured using PDFs that contained Google DoubleClick Digital Marketing (DDM) open redirects that led unsuspecting victims to compromised sites hosting the Microsoft Windows SmartScreen bypass CVE-2024-21412 that led to malicious Microsoft (.MSI) installers," Trend Micro  said . CVE-2024-21412 (CVSS score: 8.1) concerns an internet shortcut files security feature bypass vulnerability that permits an unauthenticated attacker to circumvent SmartScreen protections by tricking a victim into clicking on a specially crafted file. It was  fixed  by Microsoft as part of its Patch Tuesday updates for February 2024, but not before it was weaponized by a threat actor called  Water Hydra  (aka DarkCasino) to deliver the DarkMe malware in attacks targeting financial instituti...

At least four different threat actors have been identified as involved in an updated version of a massive ad fraud and residential proxy scheme called BADBOX , painting a picture of an interconnected cybercrime ecosystem. This includes SalesTracker Group, MoYu Group, Lemon Group, and LongTV, according to new findings from the HUMAN Satori Threat Intelligence and Research team, published in collaboration with Google, Trend Micro, Shadowserver, and other partners. The "complex and expansive fraud operation" has been codenamed BADBOX 2.0. It has been described as the largest botnet of infected connected TV (CTV) devices ever uncovered. "BADBOX 2.0, like its predecessor, begins with backdoors on low-cost consumer devices that enable threat actors to load fraud modules remotely," the company said . "These devices communicate with command-and-control (C2) servers owned and operated by a series of distinct but cooperative threat actors." The threat actors ar...

The cyber world never hits pause, and staying alert matters more than ever. Every week brings new tricks, smarter attacks, and fresh lessons from the field. This recap cuts through the noise to share what really matters—key trends, warning signs, and stories shaping today's security landscape. Whether you're defending systems or just keeping up, these highlights help you spot what's coming before it lands on your screen. ⚡ Threat of the Week Oracle 0-Day Under Attack — Threat actors with ties to the Cl0p ransomware group have exploited a zero-day flaw in E-Business Suite to facilitate data theft attacks. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-61882 (CVSS score: 9.8), concerns an unspecified bug that could allow an unauthenticated attacker with network access via HTTP to compromise and take control of the Oracle Concurrent Processing component. In a post shared on LinkedIn, Charles Carmakal, CTO of Mandiant at Google Cloud, said "Cl0p exploited multiple vulnerabilities in Ora...

The Russian advanced persistent threat (APT) group known as COLDRIVER has been attributed to a fresh round of ClickFix-style attacks designed to deliver two new "lightweight" malware families tracked as BAITSWITCH and SIMPLEFIX. Zscaler ThreatLabz, which detected the new multi-stage ClickFix campaign earlier this month, described BAITSWITCH as a downloader that ultimately drops SIMPLEFIX, a PowerShell backdoor. COLDRIVER , also tracked as Callisto, Star Blizzard, and UNC4057, is the moniker assigned to a Russia-linked threat actor that's known to target a wide range of sectors since 2019. While early campaign waves were observed using spear-phishing lures to direct targets to credential harvesting pages, the group has been fleshing out its arsenal with custom tools like SPICA and LOSTKEYS , which underscores its technical sophistication. The adversary's use of ClickFix tactics was previously documented by the Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) back in May 2...

Pakistan has become the latest target of a threat actor called the Smishing Triad, marking the first expansion of its footprint beyond the E.U., Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E., and the U.S. "The group's latest tactic involves sending malicious messages on behalf of Pakistan Post to customers of mobile carriers via iMessage and SMS," Resecurity said in a report published earlier this week. "The goal is to steal their personal and financial information." The threat actors, believed to be Chinese-speaking , are known to leverage stolen databases sold on the dark web to send bogus SMS messages, enticing recipients into clicking on links under the pretext of informing them of a failed package delivery and urging them to update their address. Users who end up clicking on the URLs are directed to fake websites that prompt them to enter their financial information as part of a supposed service fee charged for redelivery. "Besides Pakistan Post, the group was also ...

Chinese-speaking users are the target of a search engine optimization (SEO) poisoning campaign that uses fake software sites to distribute malware. "The attackers manipulated search rankings with SEO plugins and registered lookalike domains that closely mimicked legitimate software sites," Fortinet FortiGuard Labs researcher Pei Han Liao said . "By using convincing language and small character substitutions, they tricked victims into visiting spoofed pages and downloading malware." The activity, which was discovered by the cybersecurity company in August 2025, leads to the deployment of malware families like HiddenGh0st and Winos (aka ValleyRAT), both of which are variants of a remote access trojan called Gh0st RAT. It's worth noting that the use of Winos has been attributed to a cybercrime group known as Silver Fox , which is also tracked as SwimSnake, The Great Thief of Valley (or Valley Thief), UTG-Q-1000, and Void Arachne. It's believed to be acti...

A new malware family called  Realst  has become the latest to target Apple macOS systems, with a third of the samples already designed to infect macOS 14 Sonoma, the upcoming major release of the operating system. Written in the Rust programming language, the malware is distributed in the form of bogus blockchain games and is capable of "emptying crypto wallets and stealing stored password and browser data" from both Windows and macOS machines. Realst was first discovered in the wild by security researcher  iamdeadlyz . "Realst Infostealer is distributed via malicious websites advertising fake blockchain games with names such as Brawl Earth, WildWorld, Dawnland, Destruction, Evolion, Pearl, Olymp of Reptiles, and SaintLegend," SentinelOne security researcher Phil Stokes  said  in a report. "Each version of the fake blockchain game is hosted on its own website complete with associated Twitter and Discord accounts." The cybersecurity firm, which identif...

The macOS information stealer known as Atomic is now being delivered to target via a bogus web browser update chain tracked as ClearFake. "This may very well be the first time we see one of the main social engineering campaigns, previously reserved for Windows, branch out not only in terms of geolocation but also operating system," Malwarebytes' Jérôme Segura  said  in a Tuesday analysis. Atomic Stealer (aka AMOS),  first documented  in April 2023, is a commercial stealer malware family that's sold on a subscription basis for $1,000 per month. It comes with capabilities to siphon data from web browsers and cryptocurrency wallets. Then in September 2023, Malwarebytes  detailed  an Atomic Stealer campaign that took advantage of malicious Google ads, tricking macOS users searching for a financial charting platform known as TradingView into downloading the malware. ClearFake, on the other hand, is a nascent malware distribution operation that employs comp...

As part of the latest "season" of Operation Endgame , a coalition of law enforcement agencies have taken down about 300 servers worldwide, neutralized 650 domains, and issued arrest warrants against 20 targets. Operation Endgame, first launched in May 2024, is an ongoing law enforcement operation targeting services and infrastructures assisting in or directly providing initial or consolidating access for ransomware. The previous edition focused on dismantling the initial access malware families that have been used to deliver ransomware. The latest iteration, per Europol, targeted new malware variants and successor groups that re-emerged after last year's takedowns such as Bumblebee, Lactrodectus, QakBot, HijackLoader, DanaBot, TrickBot, and WARMCOOKIE . The interaction action was carried out between May 19 and 22, 2025. "In addition, €3.5 million in cryptocurrency was seized during the action week, bringing the total amount seized during the Operation Endgame to...

The Uyghur community located in China and Pakistan has been the subject of an ongoing espionage campaign aiming to trick the targets into downloading a Windows backdoor to amass sensitive information from their systems. "Considerable effort was put into disguising the payloads, whether by creating delivery documents that appear to be originating from the United Nations using up to date related themes, or by setting up websites for non-existing organizations claiming to fund charity groups," according to joint research published by Check Point Research and Kaspersky today. The Uyghurs are a Turkic ethnic minority group originating from Central and East Asia and are recognized as native to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in Northwest China. At least since 2015, government authorities have placed the region under tight surveillance, putting hundreds of thousands into prisons and internment camps that the government calls "Vocational Education and Training Centers....