Cyware Weekly Threat Intelligence, February 08 - 12, 2021

Cyware Weekly Threat Intelligence, February 08 - 12, 2021 - Featured Image

Weekly Threat Briefing • February 12, 2021

The Good

This year seems to be bringing out the humanity in threat actors, at least in some. Another ransomware shut down shop and apologized for being a pain. Also, let me ask you a question. What do musicians, influencers, and sports celebrities have in common? All of them got more than $100 million worth of cryptocurrency stolen from them. But, fret not. Suspects have been arrested.

  • The Ziggy ransomware gang apologized on Telegram for its activities and announced shutting down its operations. It has released the decryption keys.

  • Google announced launching a database for open source vulnerabilities, which would be a triage infrastructure for open source projects.

  • CyberArk researchers released BlobHunter, an open-source tool organizations can use to discover unsecured Azure blobs containing sensitive files inadvertently exposed by them.

  • The UK National Crime Agency, in coordination with the Europol, arrested ten suspects who siphoned off $100 million in cryptocurrency in numerous SIM-swapping attacks targeted at high-profile U.S. celebrities.

The Bad

Attacks on critical infrastructure just got extreme where physical risks to lives could be incurred. This week made us all ponder over the severity of cyberwar after an intruder tried poisoning a Florida city’s water supply. The alleged source code of Witcher 3 was put on auction. Lastly, Conti means business and by business, it means leaking data until the victims end up paying. This week two healthcare providers fell prey to this ignominious ransomware.

  • Hacktivists hijacked and defaced the DNS records of several Sri Lankan websites that include Google.lk and Oracle.lk. Users visiting these sites were redirected to web pages detailing various social issues impacting the local population.

  • Iranian threat actor group, Charming Kitten, has been linked with a massive cyberespionage campaign that involves the use of Furball spyware. The spyware is distributed via malicious wallpaper and gaming apps.

  • A hacker hacked into a water treatment plant in Oldsmar, Florida, in an attempt to poison the water supply by increasing the level of sodium hydroxide, also known as lye.

  • A cyberattack on Charles J.Hilton & Associates P.C. (CJH) potentially exposed the personal health information of more than 36,000 patients at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC).

  • First, the Polish video game company CD Projekt revealed falling victim to a cyberattack that affected some of its internal systems. Later, its source code for GWENT was leaked on a popular hacking forum in what appears to be a double extortion strategy. Now, threat actors are found auctioning the alleged source code for CD Projekt Red games, including The Witcher 3, Thronebreaker, and Cyberpunk 2077.

  • Conti ransomware operators published patients’ data stolen from two U.S. hospital chains. The affected organizations are the Florida-based Leon Medical Centers and Nocona-General Hospital in Texas.

  • Finnish therapy psychotherapy practice firm, Vastaamo, has declared bankruptcy after falling victim to a horrific security breach. The problem first began in 2018, when the firm discovered that a database of customer details and notes had been accessed by hackers.

  • A database belonging to Ukraine’s PrivatBank is being offered for sale on a popular hacking forum. It contains 40 million records that include full names, dates of birth, places of birth, passport details, and phone numbers of customers.

  • Singtel and QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute are investigating potential data breaches caused by vulnerabilities in Accellion’s file-sharing system.

  • No Support Linux Hosting came to a close due to a breach that impacted the company’s entire operation, including its official website, admin section, and customer database.

New threats

It’s the second week of February and apparently, love is in the air. However, do you know what else is in the air and all around you? Love scams! Along with this deception, we saw the emergence of a new ransomware strain that is no longer reliant on a C2 server for communication. Such tech, much danger. Before signing off, we also need to mention that the BazarBackdoor malware got a makeover and now it can evade detection.

  • Zeoticus 2.0 ransomware emerged on the threat landscape and doesn’t depend on a C2 server. It relies on faster encryption algorithms such as XChaCha20, Poly1305, XSalsa202, and Curve25519.
  • A new phishing attack campaign has been observed using Morse code to hide malicious URLs in an email attachment. The ultimate goal is to bypass secure email gateways or mail filters during the infection process.
  • A set of nine new vulnerabilities, collectively known as Number:Jack, was identified in multiple TCP/IP stacks used by millions of IoT and OT devices. These flaws could allow attackers to intercept and manipulate data.
  • A newly discovered variant of the LodaRAT malware is targeting Windows and Android devices in a new espionage campaign. Linked to the Kasablanka threat actor group, the malware is used to spy on users in Bangladesh.
  • BendyBear is a new, highly sophisticated malware potentially linked to the BlackTech hacking group. The malware has features and behavior that strongly resembles the WaterBear malware family that has been active since 2009. It leverages the existing Windows registry key that is enabled by default on Windows 10.
  • BazarBackdoor malware has been rewritten in the Nim programming language with a purpose to evade detection by security software. Once a computer becomes infected, BazarBackdoor is used to provide the threat actors remote access to the computer to spread laterally throughout a network.
  • Researchers have uncovered two malware families called Hornbill and Sunbird targeting military, nuclear, and election entities in India and Pakistan. The two malware are capable of exfiltrating SMS messages, encrypted messaging app content and geolocation, and other sensitive information.
  • UAE and Kuwait government agencies are targets of a new cyberespionage campaign potentially carried out by the Iran-based MuddyWater threat actor group. The objective of the campaign is to install a remote management tool called ScreenConnect, customized with malware samples and URLs masquerading as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
  • Pre-valentine malware attacks were found to be sent via emails confirming hefty orders from flower and lingerie shops, Rose World and Ajour, respectively. This spear-phishing attack directs victims to a malicious document that executes the BazaLoader malware.
  • Adobe is warning of a critical buffer overflow vulnerability being exploited in the wild. The flaw, tracked as CVE-2021-21017, is being used to target Adobe Reader users on Windows. It can lead to arbitrary execution of code on affected systems.

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May 2, 2025

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Apr 11, 2025

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Mar 28, 2025

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Mar 21, 2025

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The race to outpace quantum threats is officially on. The NCSC has issued guidance to help organizations transition to post-quantum cryptography by 2035, with a focus on NIST-approved algorithms and planned support for critical sectors. A nationwide fraud crackdown ends with hundreds behind bars. Operation Henhouse led to 422 arrests and the seizure of millions in assets, as U.K. police target the country’s most widespread and costly crime - fraud. A threat actor briefly exposed their entire playbook. Researchers found a public server hosting tools tied to a campaign targeting South Korea, including a Rust-compiled payload delivering Cobalt Strike Cat and a list of over 1,000 potential targets. Phishing messages on Signal are leading to full system compromise. CERT-UA warns of DarkCrystal RAT attacks targeting Ukraine’s defense sector, using fake contacts and malicious files to trick victims into executing spyware. Ransomware slipped into VSCode under the radar. Two malicious extensions were discovered on the VSCode Marketplace, bypassing checks to deliver test-stage ransomware demanding ShibaCoin for decryption. Fake ads are being weaponized to steal Google credentials. A campaign targeting Semrush users is redirecting victims to spoofed login pages, where attackers harvest Google account logins through a fake “Log in with Google” prompt. A fake browser update could cost you more than a few clicks. A new ClearFake campaign is using fake reCAPTCHA and Turnstile pages to deliver malware like Lumma and Vidar Stealer, with payloads fetched through Binance’s Smart Chain. Hackers are quietly poisoning AI-generated code. A new supply chain attack targets AI editors like Copilot and Cursor, exploiting rules files to inject malicious prompts that trick the tools into writing compromised code.

Mar 14, 2025

Cyware Weekly Threat Intelligence, March 10–14, 2025

A Russian hosting provider is feeling the heat from global sanctions. Australia, the U.K., and the U.S. have sanctioned Zservers, a bulletproof hosting provider linked to ransomware and fraud, freezing its assets and restricting operations. Switzerland is tightening its grip on cyber incident reporting. Starting April 1, critical infrastructure operatorsmust report cyberattacks to the NCSC within 24 hours, reinforcing national cybersecurity defenses. Cybercriminals are upgrading their toolkit for long-term access. Ragnar Loader is being leveraged by ransomware groups like FIN7, FIN8, and Ragnar Locker, evolving into a stealthier and more modular malware for persistent system compromise. Chinese hackers are slipping past defenses in Juniper routers. The UNC3886 threat group is backdooring older Juniper MX routers, bypassing security protections and embedding custom TinyShell malware to maintain access. North Korean hackers are adding ransomware to their arsenal. Moonstone Sleet (Storm-1789) is deploying Qilin ransomware, using fake companies and trojanized tools to infiltrate targets through LinkedIn and freelance platforms. A botnet is turning home routers into attack platforms. The Ballista botnet is exploiting an unpatched TP-Link Archer router flaw (CVE-2023-1389) to spread stealthily, using Tor domains and remote command execution to launch DDoS attacks worldwide. Copy, paste, and lose your crypto. MassJacker hijacks clipboard transactions, swapping wallet addresses with attacker-controlled ones, stealing funds from victims who unknowingly send money to the wrong destination. A fake CAPTCHA is all it takes to get root access. The OBSCURE#BAT campaign is using social engineering tactics to install the r77 rootkit, bypassing defenses and targeting English-speaking users with stealthy, persistent malware.

Mar 7, 2025

Cyware Weekly Threat Intelligence, March 03–07, 2025

The code caves of GitHub just got a cleanup crew courtesy of Microsoft. A sprawling malvertising campaign that snagged nearly a million devices worldwide has been knocked down a peg. Cheap Android gadgets are getting a breather from a relentless digital pest. The BadBox 2.0 botnet, a souped-up sequel backed by multiple threat crews, saw 24 shady apps booted from Google Play and half a million infected devices cut off from their puppet masters, thanks to some crafty sinkholing and Google’s cleanup sweep. A sneaky gatecrasher has turned WordPress into a redirect rollercoaster. A malicious JavaScript injection lurking in a theme file has snagged at least 31 sites, pulling visitors through a two-step detour to shady third-party domains. Japan’s digital defenses are under siege from a shadowy crew with a taste for chaos. Since January, unknown threat actors have been prying open organizations in tech, telecom, entertainment, and more, exploiting CVE-2024-4577 in PHP-CGI on Windows. Crooks posing as the Electronic Frontier Foundation are targeting Albion Online players with phishing emails and fake PDFs, claiming account trouble. It’s a ruse to drop Stealc malware and Pyramid C2. A fresh face in the cybercrime underworld is juggling a bag of nasty surprises. EncryptHub is hitting users of QQ Talk, WeChat, Google Meet, and more with trojanized apps and slick multi-stage attacks. The Eleven11bot botnet, loosely tied to Iran, has taken over 86,000 IoT devices to slam telecoms and gaming servers with relentless DDoS barrages. Social media’s sunny side has a dark shadow creeping across the Middle East and North Africa. Since September 2024, Desert Dexter has been slinging a tweaked AsyncRAT via legit file-sharing sites and Telegram. For detailed Cyber Threat Intel, click ‘Read More’.

Feb 28, 2025

Cyware Weekly Threat Intelligence, February 24–28, 2025

Stay ahead of cyber threats with the latest on the Vo1d botnet infecting Android TVs, GitVenom malware on GitHub, Redox Stealer, LCRYX ransomware, and a critical WordPress XSS vulnerability. Plus, insights on Lotus Blossom cyber espionage, PolarEdge malware targeting routers, Chrome extension hijacks, and PayPal phishing scams. Get the full security briefing now!