News – December 2025


  • Sanctioned spyware maker Intellexa had direct access to government espionage victims, researchers say

    December 4, 2025

    Spyware maker Intellexa had remote access to some of its government customers’ surveillance systems, giving company staffers the ability to see the personal data of people whose phones had been hacked with its Predator spyware, according to new evidence published by Amnesty International. On Thursday, Amnesty and a coalition of media partners, including Israeli newspaper Haaretz, ...

  • International takedown of cryptocurrency fraud network laundering over EUR 700 million

    December 4, 2025

    The final actions in a sweeping international operation have successfully dismantled a large-scale cryptocurrency fraud and money laundering network that had laundered over EUR 700 million. Coordinated across multiple jurisdictions, these actions, carried out last month and earlier this week, mark the culmination of years of investigation and the effective disruption of a criminal operation ...

  • Freedom Mobile Confirms Customer Data Breach

    December 4, 2025

    Canadian telecommunications provider Freedom Mobile suffered a supply-chain attack recently, in which it lost sensitive data on a yet undisclosed number of customers. In a data breach notification letter posted on its website earlier this week, Freedom said hackers broke into an account of a subcontractor, through which they accessed personal information “of a limited number” ...

  • UK: Information Commissioner’s Office reprimands Post Office for data breach

    December 4, 2025

    The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has issued a reprimand to the Post Office following a data breach that resulted in the unauthorised disclosure of personal information belonging to hundreds of postmasters involved in the Horizon IT scandal. The breach occurred when the Post Office’s communications team mistakenly published an unredacted version of a legal settlement document ...

  • Principles for the Secure Integration of Artificial Intelligence in Operational Technology

    December 3, 2025

    Since the public release of ChatGPT in November 2022, artificial intelligence (AI) has been integrated into many facets of human society. For critical infrastructure owners and operators, AI can potentially be used to increase efficiency and productivity, enhance decision-making, save costs, and improve customer experience. Despite the many benefits, integrating AI into operational technology (OT) environments ...

  • Hook for Gold: Inside GoldFactory’s Сampaign That Turns Apps Into Goldmines

    December 3, 2025

    In February 2024, Group-IB uncovered sophisticated mobile threat campaigns that show how fast banking malware is evolving across the Asia-Pacific region. Ongoing monitoring of this evolving threat revealed a surge of aggressive mobile Trojans targeting both iOS and Android users, all operated by a single threat actor tracked as GoldFactory. Since releasing our initial report, we ...

  • Iranian hacker group deploys malicious Snake game to target Egyptian and Israeli critical infrastructure

    December 3, 2025

    An Iranian-aligned hacking group tracked as ‘MuddyWater’ has dramatically shifted tactics in attacks against Israeli and Egyptian critical infrastructure. Previous campaigns by the group, observed by ESET Research, were characteristically noisy in their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) making them easily detectable. However, the group has begun employing a new backdoor deployed via the Fooder loader, ...

  • Shai Hulud 2.0, now with a wiper flavor

    December 3, 2025

    In September, a new breed of malware distributed via compromised Node Package Manager (npm) packages made headlines. It was dubbed “Shai-Hulud”, and Kaspersky published an in-depth analysis of it in another post. Recently, a new version was discovered. Shai Hulud 2.0 is a type of two-stage worm-like malware that spreads by compromising npm tokens to republish ...

  • India pulls mandate to preinstall government app on smartphones

    December 3, 2025

    India has backed away from its plan to force smartphone makers to preinstall a government app on all devices, following backlash and mounting concerns that the mandate would expand state access to users’ devices and weaken privacy protections. On Wednesday, the Indian telecom ministry said Sanchar Saathi, an anti-theft and cybersecurity protection app, would remain voluntary ...

  • Attackers have a new way to slip past your MFA

    December 3, 2025

    Attackers are using a tool called Evilginx to steal session cookies, letting them bypass the need for a multi-factor authentication (MFA) token. Researchers are warning about a rise in cases where this method is used against educational institutions. Evilginx is an attacker-in-the-middle phishing toolkit that sits between you and the real website, relaying the genuine sign-in ...