The Good

U.S. President Joe Biden signed a new law that mandates companies in the U.S. to report cybersecurity breaches within 72 hours. Whereas, the U.K government introduced the Online Safety Bill which takes a leap into securing user privacy. As we have seen in the past few weeks, TrickBot has become a menace to MicroTik routers. Microsoft, hence, introduced an open-source tool that helps detect TrickBot infections.

• Under the new cyber incident reporting law signed by President Biden, critical infrastructure organizations will be required to report cyber incidents to the DHS within 72 hours of the discovery of the event, and within 24 hours if they make a ransomware payment.
• NIST issued a new cybersecurity practice guide, named “NIST SP 1800-10, Protecting Information and System Integrity in Industrial Control System Environments: Cybersecurity for the Manufacturing Sector.” This publication would aid manufacturers to improve the cybersecurity of their ICS environments.
• The NSA and the CISA have released the updated Cybersecurity Technical Report for Kubernetes customers. It will aid them in better managing and securing container applications. The update, moreover, consists of extra explanations and details based on feedback from the industry.
• The U.K government passed the Online Safety Bill to force tech companies into protecting their users from dangerous content on social media platforms. Failure to cooperate can result in jail time or prosecution.
• Microsoft launched an open-source tool—RouterOS Scanner—to secure MicroTik routers and check for IOCs for TrickBot infections. The tool enables users to check the device version and charts it to known vulnerabilities. It also searches for DNS cache poisoning, traffic redirection rules, scheduled tasks, suspicious files, default port changes, non-default users, and firewall rules.

The Bad

Another vulnerability is plaguing QNAP devices. Threat actors are actively abusing the high-severity flaw, Dirty Pipe. It is time to remove affected devices from the internet. Let’s take a look at the state of breaches this week. Pandora ransomware played Denso dirty, stole a massive amount of data. While we are on the topic of breaches, an attack on SDCA exposed the personal data of hundreds of thousands of people.

• Automotive giant Denso confirmed a cyberattack by Pandora ransomware. While the incident is under investigation, the attackers revealed that they have stolen 1.4TB of data from the firm. This includes a purchase order, a technical component document, and a sales file.

• The operators behind the Lampion trojan continue to use fake email templates of banking organizations in Portugal to distribute the malware. The TTPs and capabilities remain the same as observed in 2019. Also, the C2 server, which is geolocated in Russia, is the same as noticed in past campaigns since 2020.

• New finding shows that there is an overlap of source code and techniques between Shamoon and Kwampirs. Additionally, it is revealed that the same group or really close collaborators are behind both the malware families. The similarities include the functionality to retrieve system metadata and fetch MAC address and the victim’s keyboard layout information, as well as the use of the same InternetOpenW Windows API to craft HTTP requests.

• An Iran-linked hacking group has been held responsible for DDoS attacks on Israeli government sites (with the .GOV.IL domain). Following these attacks, the affected websites were down for some time before they were restored to a normal state.

• Fake Windows antivirus updates are being used to install Cobalt Strike and other malware on systems in Ukraine. These updates are distributed via phishing emails that pretend to be from Ukrainian government agencies. They include a link to a French website that contains a download button for the supposed antivirus software updates.

• An ongoing, widespread intrusion campaign that distributes the Zloader trojan has been detected by researchers. The campaign leveraged fake installers of legitimate tools such as Zoom, Atera, NetSupport, Brave Browser, JavaPugin, and TeamViewer to perform reconnaissance and download the malware.

• The FBI warned that Russian state-backed hackers gained access to an NGO cloud by exploiting a combination of flaws in Duo MFA and Windows Print Spooler. To breach the network, threat actors had also used brute-force attacks to access an unenrolled and inactive account that was not disabled in the organization’s Active Directory.

• A cyberattack on South Denver Cardiology Associates (SDCA) had exposed the PHI of almost 300,000 patients. The attack was detected on January 4, and the impacted information included patients’ names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, drivers’ license numbers, patient account numbers, and health insurance information.

• Another 15 new vulnerabilities have been added to CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. The new list includes multiple flaws affecting Microsoft Windows and a buffer overflow vulnerability in SonicWall SonicOS. The agency has strongly urged organizations to remediate identified vulnerabilities to reduce their exposure to cyberattacks.

• QNAP warned that most of its Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices are impacted by a high severity Linux flaw, dubbed Dirty Pipe. The flaw affects devices running QTS 5.0.x and QuTS hero h5.o.x. The firm is yet to release security updates. Meanwhile, it is advised to stop exposing the affected devices to the internet.

• An email phishing campaign that purported to be from Instagram technical support was used against a prominent U.S. life insurance company to steal login credentials from employees. The email prompted recipients to verify their accounts within 24 hours to prevent the deactivation of their membership. Anyone clicking on the link provided in the email was redirected to a phishing page that looked similar to the Instagram login page.

• Around 281 WordPress sites hosted on GoDaddy were infected by a backdoor. The affected sites include MediaTemple, tsoHost, 123Reg, Domain Factory, Heart Internet, and Host Europe. The campaign leveraged SEO poisoning attacks to launch the backdoor and stole money and personal information from users.

• Nearly 2,113 misconfigured mobile apps with tens of millions of downloads were found leaking users' data. The issue existed in the backend cloud databases. One of these apps belonged to a social audio platform that leaked bank details, location, phone numbers, and chat messages. Another bookkeeping app had exposed 280,000 phone numbers linked to at least 80,000 company names, addresses, bank balances, cash balances, invoice counts, and emails.

• Hackers are targeting poorly secured Microsoft SQL and MySQL database servers to deploy the Gh0stCringe RAT on devices. The RAT is a powerful malware that establishes a connection with the C2 server to receive custom commands or exfiltrate stolen information to the adversaries.

• Cybercriminals are exploiting the Russia-Ukraine conflict to steal financial donations meant for Ukrainian inhabitants. Most are mimicking legitimate aid organizations, while some even impersonated Aronov Maxim, a doctor at Smile Children’s Hospital. The phishing emails are sent with subject lines such as “Help save the children in Ukraine,” “Help - Bitcoin,” and “Ukraine Donations.”

• The CISA and the FBI stated that satellite communications (SATCOM) across the world are at risk of cyberattacks. The security advisory warned U.S. critical infrastructure organizations of the same following several network breaches. The federal agencies have recommended SATCOM network providers add additional egress and ingress monitoring to identify anomalous traffic.

• The Singapore Police warned against SMS phishing scams deceiving unsuspecting users by luring them to a fake Singpass website. The messages are sent from unknown numbers, informing recipients that their Singpass accounts have expired and they need to click on an embedded link to reactivate the accounts.

New Threats

Linux systems face a new threat in the form of the B1txor20 botnet that exploits the Log4j flaw. The botnet is under active development. The cyberworld also has a new evasive ransomware threat, LokiLocker. Just like the trickster Loki. Emotet is back with a new campaign during this tax season. It is sending out phishing emails impersonating the IRS.

• A new RedLiner stealer campaign that uses Valorant cheat lures to trick players into downloading the malware has been identified by researchers. The campaign makes use of YouTube to disseminate these fake cheat tools to target the Valorant gaming community.

• A new variant of Maxtrilha trojan has been found impacting users in Portugal since last month. The campaign leverages phishing emails impersonating tax services in Portugal. The malware variant is capable of recording keystrokes, stealing sensitive information, and capturing screenshots.

• The Aberebot Android banking trojan has returned as Escobar to target users. It includes several new capabilities, such as stealing Google Authenticator MFA codes, recording audio, taking photos, and harvesting victims’ bank account credentials.

• A new CaddyWiper malware has affected a dozen systems across Ukraine. The malware is designed to damage targeted systems by erasing user data, programs, hard drives, and partition information. Researchers indicate that the malware does not share any significant code similarities with HermeticWiper or IssacWiper malware. In some cases, it was distributed through Microsoft Group Policy.

• A newly found B1txor20 botnet targeting Linux systems is under active development. It attempts to turn devices into an army of bots ready to steal sensitive info by installing rootkits, creating reverse shells, and acting as web traffic proxies. It targets Linux ARM, X64 CPU architecture devices by exploiting the Log4j vulnerability.

• Blackberry warned about a new ransomware threat, dubbed LokiLocker, targeting English-speaking victims and their Windows systems. LokiLocker acts as a limited-access RaaS family and is sold to a selective few affiliates after proper vetting.

• Emotet trojan is taking advantage of the 2022 U.S. tax season to send out malicious emails pretending to be from the Internal Revenue Service. The attackers hijack victims’ email conversations as part of the infection chain to send fake tax forms or federal returns. Once the victim opens the attached Word or Excel document, they are tricked into enabling macros that download the malware onto the computer.

• The DirtyMoe malware has gained new worm-like capabilities to expand its reach. The worming module targets older well-known vulnerabilities such as Hot Potato privilege escalation vulnerability in Windows to gain reconnaissance.

• Researchers disclosed a new Cryptorom scam that has been active since 2021. The scam primarily affected Bumble and Tinder users across Asia, the U.S., and Europe by luring them into downloading fake cryptocurrency apps. As per the latest update, scammers have evolved their tactics and are now leveraging WhatsApp to expand their reach. The message pretends to offer investment opportunities and trading tips, along with links to fake cryptocurrency and trading apps that would generate huge financial returns for victims.

• A new round of fake SMSes pretending to come from Royal Mail was found targeting users in the U.K. The message prompts the recipients to confirm the tracking number with the name - as the label was damaged - by clicking on a link. The link redirects the victims to a sign-up form for a ‘new iPhone 12’ parcel, for which they would be charged a small amount.

• A new strain of the Cyclops Blink malware targeted multiple Asus router models. This botnet is written in the C programming language and is deployed by the Russian-based Sandworm APT. Researchers surmise that the malware’s primary motive is to build an infrastructure for attacks on high-value targets.

• The financially-motivated LightBasin group is using a new Unix rootkit to exfiltrate ATM banking data and perform banking fraud. Dubbed Caketap, the Unix kernel module is deployed on servers running the Oracle Solaris OS. Caketap can hide network files, processes, and connections, and install hooks into system functions for remote commands and configurations.