SteelFox Leverages Signed Windows Drivers to Attack Kernel


This week, the SonicWall Capture Labs threat research team investigated a sample of SteelFox malware.

This is bundled with “software activators” for JetBrains and Foxit PDF readers. During installation, they run as a service and use vulnerable signed Windows drivers to exploit and attack the kernel. Secondarily, cryptominers such as XMRig are run in memory via AppInfo, as well as network communications. The sample is detected as an executable without a packer or protector; however, the file entropy shows that it is, in fact, packed.

Read more…
Source: SonicWall


Sign up for our Newsletter


Related:

  • Don’t pay Vect a ransom – your data’s likely already wiped out

    April 28, 2026

    Organizations hit by the wave of Trivy and Lite LLM supply-chain compromises that paid Vect in hopes of recovering their data likely did not get much back, according to Check Point Research. That’s because the ransomware Vect uses isn’t actually ransomware at all, but a wiper that destroys any file larger than 128KB. Vect’s leak site ...

  • Chinese engineer stole US military and NASA software for years

    April 28, 2026

    International espionage isn’t always about sophisticated malware and zero-day bugs. Sometimes it’s as simple as pretending to be someone else asking for a favor. For four years, a Chinese aerospace engineer did just that. Dozens of researchers at NASA, the US military, and major universities handed him exactly what he asked for, and possibly violated US ...

  • ADT confirms cyber intrusion after ShinyHunters extortion attempt

    April 27, 2026

    A home security biz getting digitally burgled is not a great look – but that’s exactly where ADT finds itself. The company has confirmed a cyber intrusion following an extortion attempt by the ShinyHunters crew, which claims to have made off with more than 10 million records. US-based ADT is one of the world’s largest providers ...

  • Attackers use hidden SMS and signalling systems to track targets’ location

    April 24, 2026

    Security researchers have just unveiled details of two covert surveillance campaigns that exploit weaknesses in the global telecom infrastructure. In a report published on Thursday, Citizen Lab explains that attackers abuse the signalling systems mobile operators use to support roaming, route messages, and locate devices on the network. The weaknesses were used to track certain subscribers ...

  • Governments on high alert after CISA snuffs out Firestarter backdoor on fed network

    April 24, 2026

    A US federal agency was successfully targeted by a previously unknown backdoor malware called Firestarter, according to CISA cybersnoops and their UK counterparts – neither of which disclosed the agency’s name. Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies include NASA; Homeland Security itself (cyberworkers at CISA are part of an operational unit in Homeland Security); the FBI; the DoJ; the IRS; the ...

  • PhantomRPC: A new privilege escalation technique in Windows Remote Procedure Call

    April 24, 2026

    Windows Interprocess Communication (IPC) is one of the most complex technologies within the Windows operating system. At the core of this ecosystem is the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) mechanism, which can function as a standalone communication channel or as the underlying transport layer for more advanced interprocess communication technologies. Because of its complexity and widespread ...