Staying a Step Ahead: Mitigating the DPRK IT Worker Threat


Since 2022, Mandiant has tracked and reported on IT workers operating on behalf of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). These workers pose as non-North Korean nationals to gain employment with organizations across a wide range of industries in order to generate revenue for the North Korean regime, particularly to evade sanctions and fund its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and ballistic missile programs.

A U.S. government advisory in 2022 noted that these workers have also leveraged privileged access obtained through their employment in order to enable malicious cyber intrusions, an observation corroborated by Mandiant and other organizations.

Read more…
Source:  Mandiant


Sign up for our Newsletter


Related:

  • Lost in Translation: When Industrial Protocol Translation goes Wrong

    August 5, 2020

    Translation makes it possible to exchange information across the globe, regardless of language differences. Translation plays a similar role in industrial internet of things (IIoT) environments where different devices, such as interfaces, sensors, and machines, use different protocols. Protocol gateways handle the translation of these different protocols in an industrial facility, allowing devices to communicate ...

  • Iranian hacker group becomes first known APT to weaponize DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH)

    August 4, 2020

    An Iranian hacking group known as Oilrig has become the first publicly known threat actor to incorporate the DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH) protocol in its attacks. Speaking in a webinar last week, Vincente Diaz, a malware analyst for antivirus maker Kaspersky, said the change happened in May this year when Oilrig added a new tool to its hacking ...

  • Unveiling the Hidden Risks of Industrial Automation Programming

    August 4, 2020

    Robots and other programmable industrial machines are the backbone of the manufacturing industry. Without them, the large-scale and fast-paced production that our modern economy depends on would simply be impossible. Critical sectors — from automotive and avionics to pharmaceuticals and food production — are reliant on these machines for the precise and efficient actions that ...

  • INTERPOL report shows alarming rate of cyberattacks during COVID-19

    August 4, 2020

    An INTERPOL assessment of the impact of COVID-19 on cybercrime has shown a significant target shift from individuals and small businesses to major corporations, governments and critical infrastructure. With organizations and businesses rapidly deploying remote systems and networks to support staff working from home, criminals are also taking advantage of increased security vulnerabilities to steal data, ...

  • Vulnerable perimeter devices: a huge attack surface

    August 4, 2020

    With the increase of critical gateway devices deployed to support off-premise work, companies across the world have to adapt to a new threat landscape where perimeter and remote access devices are now in the first line. Companies lack visibility into the growing network of internet-connected services and devices that support the new work paradigm; and the ...

  • WastedLocker ransomware abuses Windows feature to evade detection

    August 4, 2020

    The WastedLocker ransomware is abusing a Windows memory management feature to evade detection by security software. Before we get to how WastedLocker is evading detection, it is necessary to understand how anti-ransomware solutions detect ransomware. Anti-ransomware solutions will monitor the operating system for file system calls traditionally used by ransomware when encrypting a file. Read more… Source: Bleeping Computer