- Cloud Atlas seen using a new tool in its attacks
December 23, 2024
Known since 2014, Cloud Atlas targets Eastern Europe and Central Asia. We’re shedding light on a previously undocumented toolset, which the group used heavily in 2024. Victims get infected via phishing emails containing a malicious document that exploits a vulnerability in the formula editor (CVE-2018-0802) to download and execute malware code. When opened, the document downloads a ...
- BellaCPP: Discovering a new BellaCiao variant written in C++
December 20, 2024
BellaCiao is a .NET-based malware family that adds a unique twist to an intrusion, combining the stealthy persistence of a webshell with the power to establish covert tunnels. It surfaced for the first time in late April 2023 and has since been publicly attributed to the APT actor Charming Kitten. One important aspect of the BellaCiao samples ...
- Lazarus group evolves its infection chain with old and new malware
December 19, 2024
Over the past few years, the Lazarus group has been distributing its malicious software by exploiting fake job opportunities targeting employees in various industries, including defense, aerospace, cryptocurrency, and other global sectors. This attack campaign is called the DeathNote campaign and is also referred to as “Operation DreamJob”. Kaspersky researchers have previously published the history of ...
- Earth Koshchei Coopts Red Team Tools in Complex RDP Attacks
December 17, 2024
Red teaming provides essential tools and testing methodologies for organizations to strengthen their security defenses. Cybercriminals and advanced persistent threat (APT) actors pay close attention to new methods and tools red teams develop, and they may repurpose them with a malicious intent. In October 2024, an APT group that Trend Micro tracks as Earth Koshchei (also ...
- Careto is back: what’s new after 10 years of silence?
December 12, 2024
During the first week of October, Kaspersky took part in the 34th Virus Bulletin International Conference, one of the longest-running cybersecurity events. There, Kaspersky researchers delivered multiple presentations, and one of our talks focused on newly observed activities by the Careto threat actor, which is also known as “The Mask”. The Mask APT is a legendary ...
- US critical infrastructure hit once again by a new group on the scene
December 6, 2024
Storm-0227, a Chinese state-sponsored advanced persistent threat (APT) actor started targeting critical infrastructure organizations, as well as government entities, in the United States. The group abuses software vulnerabilities and engages in spear phishing attacks to gain access to people’s devices. Once they get the access, they deploy different Remote Access Trojans (RAT) and other malware to ...
- APT trends report Q3 2024
November 28, 2024
In the second half of 2022, a wave of attacks from an unknown threat actor targeted victims with a new type of attack framework that we dubbed P8. The campaign targeted Vietnamese victims, mostly from the financial sector, with some from the real estate sector. Later, in 2023, Elastic Lab published a report about an OceanLotus ...
- Spot the Difference: Earth Kasha’s New LODEINFO Campaign And The Correlation Analysis With The APT10 Umbrella
November 19, 2024
LODEINFO is a malware used in attacks targeting mainly Japan since 2019. Trend Micro has been tracking the group as Earth Kasha. While some vendors suspect that the actor using LODEINFO might be APT10, we don’t have enough evidence to fully support this speculation. Currently, we view APT10 and Earth Kasha as different entities, although they ...
- Tracking the recent activities of the APT-Q-27
November 12, 2024
Overview In May 2022, Qi’anxin Threat Intelligence Center published an article titled “Operation Dragon Breath (APT-Q-27): A Dimensionality Reduction Attack on the Gambling Industry”, disclosing the attack activities of GoldenEyeDog (Qi’anxin internal tracking number APT-Q-27) against the gambling industry, and at the end of the article introduced the Miuuti Group —— an attack group targeting ...
- Earth Simnavaz (aka APT34) Levies Advanced Cyberattacks Against Middle East
November 11, 2024
Recently, Trend Micro has been tracking Earth Simnavaz (also known as APT34 and OilRig), a cyber espionage group. This group primarily targets organizations in the energy sector, particularly those involved in oil and gas, as well as other infrastructure. It is known for using sophisticated tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to gain unauthorized access to networks ...