A Peek Into Muddled Libra’s Operational Playbook

During a September 2025 incident response investigation, Unit 42 discovered a rogue virtual machine (VM) which they believe with high confidence to be used by the cybercrime group Muddled Libra (aka Scattered Spider, UNC3944). The contents of this rogue VM Read More …

Joint Cybersecurity Advisory: Scattered Spider

Scattered Spider (also known as, UNC3944, Scatter Swine, Oktapus, Octo Tempest, Storm-0875, and Muddled Libra) engages in data extortion and several other criminal activities. Scattered Spider threat actors use multiple social engineering techniques—including push bombing—and subscriber identity module (SIM) swap Read More …

Muddled Libra Threat Assessment: Further-Reaching, Faster, More Impactful

Unit 42 has tracked and responded to several waves of intrusion operations conducted by the cybercrime group we track as Muddled Libra (aka Scattered Spider, UNC3944) across different sectors in recent months. This article contains observations on Muddled Libra thus Read More …

Hello, Operator? A Technical Analysis of Vishing Threats

Organizations are increasingly relying on diverse digital communication channels for essential business operations. The way employees interact with colleagues, access corporate resources, and especially, receive information technology (IT) support is often conducted through calls, chat platforms, and other remote technologies. Read More …

Scattered Spider hacking group allegedly behind cyber-attacks on Marks & Spencer

The culprit behind the M&S cyber attack is still a matter of investigation but speculation has pointed to a group called Scattered Spider. Also called UNC3944, Octo Tempest or Muddled Libra, Scattered Spider is a hacking group comprised of hackers Read More …

UNC3944 Targets SaaS Applications

UNC3944 is a financially motivated threat group that carries significant overlap with public reporting of “0ktapus,” “Octo Tempest,” “Scatter Swine,” and “Scattered Spider” and has been observed adapting its tactics to include data theft from software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications to attacker-owned Read More …

Octo Tempest crosses boundaries to facilitate extortion, encryption, and destruction

Microsoft has been tracking activity related to the financially motivated threat actor Octo Tempest, whose evolving campaigns represent a growing concern for organizations across multiple industries. Octo Tempest leverages broad social engineering campaigns to compromise organizations across the globe with Read More …

UNC3944 Leverages SMS Phishing Campaigns for SIM Swapping, Ransomware, Extortion, and Notoriety

UNC3944 is a financially motivated threat cluster that has persistently used phone-based social engineering and SMS phishing campaigns (smishing) to obtain credentials to gain and escalate access to victim organizations. At least some UNC3944 threat actors appear to operate in Read More …