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How to Root Windows Phone and Unlock the Bootloader to Install Custom ROMs

How to Root Windows Phone and Unlock the Bootloader to Install Custom ROMs

Nov 27, 2015
Yes, Now it is possible to unlock a Windows Lumia Phone for Root Access and run custom ROMs. Both Microsoft as well as Nokia have made Windows Lumia smartphones difficult to break into at a low-level by locking down their bootloaders, but a software hacker, who go by the name HeathCliff , has just proven that it is not impossible. HeathCliff has released an excellent tool called " Windows Phone Internals " that allows Windows phone owners to unlock their smartphone's bootloaders, gain root access and even create and run custom ROMs. What's more interesting is the tool supports " most versions of Windows Phone 8.1 and Windows 10 Mobile ". HeathCliff is very well known XDA Developer and one of the Windows Phone legends. On Windows Phone part, HeathCliff is loved mostly for the WP7 Root Tools. Windows Phone Internals or WP Internals is completely free to download though HeathCliff welcomes donations by those who have found the tool useful....
This CIA Tool Hacks Windows Computers Silently Over the Network

This CIA Tool Hacks Windows Computers Silently Over the Network

Jun 02, 2017
WikiLeaks has published a new batch of the ongoing Vault 7 leak , this time detailing an alleged CIA project that allowed the agency to turn Windows file servers into covert attack machines that can silently infect other computers of interest inside a targeted network. Codenamed Pandemic , the tool is a persistent implant for Microsoft Windows machines that share files with remote users on a local network. The documents leaked by the whistleblower organisation date from April 2014 to January 2015. According to WikiLeaks, Pandemic infect networks of Windows computers through the Server Message Block (SMB) file sharing protocol by replacing application code on-the-fly with a trojanized version of the software. "Pandemic is a tool which is run as kernel shellcode to install a file system filter driver," a leaked CIA manual reads. "The filter will 'replace' a target file with the given payload file when a remote user accesses the file via SMB (read-only, not w...
3 New CIA-developed Hacking Tools For MacOS & Linux Exposed

3 New CIA-developed Hacking Tools For MacOS & Linux Exposed

Jul 27, 2017
WikiLeaks has just published a new set of classified documents linked to another CIA project, dubbed ' Imperial ,' which reveals details of at least three CIA-developed hacking tools and implants designed to target computers running Apple Mac OS X and different flavours of Linux operating systems. If you are a regular reader of THN, you must be aware that this latest revelation by the whistleblower organisation is the part of an ongoing CIA-Vault 7 leaks, marking it as the 18th batch in the series. If you are unaware of the Vault 7 leaks, you can head on to the second of this article for having a brief look on all the leaks at once. Achilles — Tool to Backdoor Mac OS X Disk Images Dubbed Achilles , the hacking tool allows CIA operators to combine malicious Trojan applications with a legitimate Mac OS app into a disk image installer (.DMG) file. The binding tool, the shell script is written in Bash, gives the CIA operators "one or more desired operator specified e...
cyber security

The Breach You Didn't Expect: Your AppSec Stack

websiteJFrogAppSec / DevSecOps
In a market undergoing mergers and acquisitions, vendor instability can put you in serious risk.
cyber security

How AI and Zero Trust Work Together to Catch Attacks With No Files or Indicators

websiteTHN WebinarZero Trust / Cloud Security
Modern cyberattacks hide in trusted tools and workflows, evading traditional defenses. Zero Trust and AI-powered cloud security give you the visibility and control to stop these invisible threats early.
CouchPotato: CIA Hacking Tool to Remotely Spy On Video Streams in Real-Time

CouchPotato: CIA Hacking Tool to Remotely Spy On Video Streams in Real-Time

Aug 10, 2017
After disclosing CIA's strategies to hijack and manipulate webcams and microphones to corrupt or delete recordings, WikiLeaks has now published another Vault 7 leak , revealing CIA's ability to spy on video streams remotely in real-time. Dubbed ' CouchPotato ,' document leaked from the CIA details how the CIA agents use a remote tool to stealthy collect RTSP/H.264 video streams. Real Time Streaming Protocol, or RTSP, is a network control protocol designed for use in entertainment and communication systems for controlling streaming media servers. CouchPotato gives CIA hackers ability to "collect either the stream as a video file (AVI) or capture still images (JPG) of frames from the stream that are of significant change from a previously captured frame," a leaked CIA manual reads. The tool utilises FFmpeg for video and image encoding and decoding and Real Time Streaming Protocol connectivity. The CouchPotato tool works stealthily without leaving...
Newly Found Malware Uses 7 NSA Hacking Tools, Where WannaCry Uses 2

Newly Found Malware Uses 7 NSA Hacking Tools, Where WannaCry Uses 2

May 22, 2017
A security researcher has identified a new strain of malware that also spreads itself by exploiting flaws in Windows SMB file sharing protocol, but unlike the WannaCry Ransomware that uses only two leaked NSA hacking tools , it exploits all the seven. Last week, we warned you about multiple hacking groups exploiting leaked NSA hacking tools, but almost all of them were making use of only two tools: EternalBlue and DoublePulsar. Now, Miroslav Stampar, a security researcher who created famous 'sqlmap' tool and now a member of the Croatian Government CERT, has discovered a new network worm, dubbed EternalRocks , which is more dangerous than WannaCry and has no kill-switch in it. Unlike WannaCry, EternalRocks seems to be designed to function secretly in order to ensure that it remains undetectable on the affected system. However, Stampar learned of EternalRocks after it infected his SMB honeypot . The NSA exploits used by EternalRocks, which Stampar called " Do...
Wikileaks Unveils CIA Implants that Steal SSH Credentials from Windows & Linux PCs

Wikileaks Unveils CIA Implants that Steal SSH Credentials from Windows & Linux PCs

Jul 06, 2017
WikiLeaks has today published the 15th batch of its ongoing Vault 7 leak , this time detailing two alleged CIA implants that allowed the agency to intercept and exfiltrate SSH (Secure Shell) credentials from targeted Windows and Linux operating systems using different attack vectors. Secure Shell or SSH is a cryptographic network protocol used for remote login to machines and servers securely over an unsecured network. Dubbed BothanSpy — implant for Microsoft Windows Xshell client, and Gyrfalcon — targets the OpenSSH client on various distributions of Linux OS, including CentOS, Debian, RHEL (Red Hat), openSUSE and Ubuntu. Both implants steal user credentials for all active SSH sessions and then sends them to a CIA-controlled server. BothanSpy — Implant for Windows OS BothanSpy is installed as a Shellterm 3.x extension on the target machine and only works if Xshell is running on it with active sessions. Xshell is a powerful terminal emulator that supports SSH, SFTP, ...
AngelFire: CIA Malware Infects System Boot Sector to Hack Windows PCs

AngelFire: CIA Malware Infects System Boot Sector to Hack Windows PCs

Aug 31, 2017
A team of hackers at the CIA, the Central Intelligence Agency, allegedly used a Windows hacking tool against its targets to gain persistent remote access. As part of its Vault 7 leaks , WikiLeaks today revealed details about a new implant developed by the CIA, dubbed AngelFire , to target computers running Windows operating system. AngelFire framework implants a persistent backdoor on the target Windows computers by modifying their partition boot sector. AngelFire framework consists five following components: 1. Solartime — it modifies the partition boot sector to load and execute the Wolfcreek (kernel code) every time the system boots up. 2. Wolfcreek — a self-loading driver (kernel code that Solartime executes) that loads other drivers and user-mode applications 3. Keystone — a component that utilizes DLL injection technique to execute the malicious user applications directly into system memory without dropping them into the file system. 4. BadMFS — a covert ...
Here's How CIA Spies On Its Intelligence Liaison Partners Around the World

Here's How CIA Spies On Its Intelligence Liaison Partners Around the World

Aug 24, 2017
WikiLeaks has just published another Vault 7 leak, revealing how the CIA spies on their intelligence partners around the world, including FBI, DHS and the NSA, to covertly collect data from their systems. The CIA offers a biometric collection system—with predefined hardware, operating system, and software—to its intelligence liaison partners around the world that helps them voluntary share collected biometric data on their systems with each other. But since no agency share all of its collected biometric data with others, the Office of Technical Services (OTS) within CIA developed a tool to secretly exfiltrate data collections from their systems. Dubbed ExpressLane , the newly revealed CIA project details about the spying software that the CIA agents manually installs as part of a routine upgrade to the Biometric system. The leaked CIA documents reveal that the OTS officers, who maintain biometric collection systems installed at liaison services, visit their premises and se...
Wikileaks Reveals CIA Malware that Hacks & Spy On Linux Computers

Wikileaks Reveals CIA Malware that Hacks & Spy On Linux Computers

Jun 30, 2017
WikiLeaks has just published a new batch of the ongoing Vault 7 leak , this time detailing an alleged CIA project that allowed the agency to hack and remotely spy on computers running the Linux operating systems. Dubbed OutlawCountry , the project allows the CIA hackers to redirect all outbound network traffic on the targeted computer to CIA controlled computer systems for exfiltrate and infiltrate data. The OutlawCountry Linux hacking tool consists of a kernel module, which the CIA hackers load via shell access to the targeted system and create a hidden Netfilter table with an obscure name on a target Linux user. "The new table allows certain rules to be created using the "iptables" command. These rules take precedence over existing rules, and are only visible to an administrator if the table name is known. When the Operator removes the kernel module, the new table is also removed," CIA's leaked  user manual reads. Although the installation and persi...
Brutal Kangaroo: CIA-developed Malware for Hacking Air-Gapped Networks Covertly

Brutal Kangaroo: CIA-developed Malware for Hacking Air-Gapped Networks Covertly

Jun 22, 2017
WikiLeaks has published a new batch of the ongoing Vault 7 leak , this time detailing a tool suite – which is being used by the CIA for Microsoft Windows that targets "closed networks by air gap jumping using thumb drives," mainly implemented in enterprises and critical infrastructures. Air-gapped computers that are isolated from the Internet or other external networks are believed to be the most secure computers on the planet have become a regular target in recent years. Dubbed Brutal Kangaroo (v1.2.1), the tool suit was allegedly designed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in year 2012 to infiltrate a closed network or air-gapped computer within an organization or enterprise without requiring any direct access. The previous version of Brutal Kangaroo was named as EZCheese , which was exploiting a vulnerability that was zero-day until March 2015, though the newer version was using " unknown link file vulnerability (Lachesis/RiverJack) related to the lib...
WinRAR Zero-Day Under Active Exploitation – Update to Latest Version Immediately

WinRAR Zero-Day Under Active Exploitation – Update to Latest Version Immediately

Aug 11, 2025 Zero-Day / Vulnerability
The maintainers of the WinRAR file archiving utility have released an update to address an actively exploited zero-day vulnerability. Tracked as CVE-2025-8088 (CVSS score: 8.8), the issue has been described as a case of path traversal affecting the Windows version of the tool that could be exploited to obtain arbitrary code execution by crafting malicious archive files. "When extracting a file, previous versions of WinRAR, Windows versions of RAR, UnRAR, portable UnRAR source code and UnRAR.dll can be tricked into using a path, defined in a specially crafted archive, instead of a specified path," WinRAR said in an advisory. Anton Cherepanov, Peter Kosinar, and Peter Strycek from ESET have been credited for discovering and reporting the security defect, which has been addressed in WinRAR version 7.13 released on July 30, 2025. The development is the second time a WinRAR security vulnerability has been weaponized in the wild in as many years. In 2023, another vulnerabil...
How CIA Agents Covertly Steal Data From Hacked Smartphones (Without Internet)

How CIA Agents Covertly Steal Data From Hacked Smartphones (Without Internet)

Jul 13, 2017
WikiLeaks has today published the 16th batch of its ongoing Vault 7 leak , this time instead of revealing new malware or hacking tool, the whistleblower organisation has unveiled how CIA operatives stealthy collect and forward stolen data from compromised smartphones. Previously we have reported about several CIA hacking tools, malware and implants used by the agency to remotely infiltrate and steal data from the targeted systems or smartphones. However, this time neither Wikileaks nor the leaked CIA manual clearly explains how the agency operatives were using this tool. But, since we have been covering every CIA leak from the very first day, we have understood a possible scenario and have illustrated how this newly revealed tool was being used. Explained: How CIA Highrise Project Works In general, the malware uses the internet connection to send stolen data after compromising a machine to the attacker-controlled server (listening posts), but in the case of smartphones, ...
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