Category Archives: Persistent Threats

US (Sort of) Points to “Smoking Gun” Linking North Korea to Sony Hack

Citing anonymous sources in and close to the US government, The New York Times reports that the fingering of North Korea as responsible for the attack on the network of Sony Pictures Entertainment was through evidence gathered by National Security Agency surveillance. This includes software taps into networks associated with North Korea’s network warfare and espionage unit, Bureau 121, among others. The actual evidence, however, will likely never see the light of day because of the highly classified nature of how it was obtained.

David Sanger and Martin Fackler of the Times report that the NSA started to ramp up efforts to penetrate North Korea’s networks in 2010 to monitor the growth of Bureau 121 and the rest of the country’s “computer network exploitation” capabilities:

A classified security agency program expanded into an ambitious effort, officials said, to place malware that could track the internal workings of many of the computers and networks used by the North’s hackers, a force that South Korea’s military recently said numbers roughly 6,000 people. Most are commanded by the country’s main intelligence service, called the Reconnaissance General Bureau, and Bureau 121, its secretive hacking unit, with a large outpost in China.

The evidence gathered by the “early warning radar” of software painstakingly hidden to monitor North Korea’s activities proved critical in persuading President Obama to accuse the government of Kim Jong-un of ordering the Sony attack, according to the officials and experts, who spoke on the condition of anonymity about the classified NSA operation.

The NSA’s Tailored Access Office, according to the report, “drilled into the Chinese networks that connect North Korea to the outside world, picked through connections in Malaysia favored by North Korean hackers, and penetrated directly into the North with the help of South Korea and other American allies.” According to NSA documents released by Der Spiegel, some of South Korea’s initial assistance was not voluntary—the NSA secretly exploited South Korea’s existing hacks of North Korea to gain intelligence information. But despite the level of access they gained, according to an unnamed investigator into the Sony Pictures attack, the NSA and other US agencies “couldn’t really understand the severity” of the attack that would be launched against Sony when they began on November 24.

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Critical networks in US, 15 other nations, completely owned, possibly by Iran

For more than two years, pro-Iranian hackers have penetrated some of the world’s most sensitive computer networks, including those operated by a US-based airline, auto maker, natural gas producer, defense contractor, and military installation, security researchers said.

In many cases, “Operation Cleaver,” as the sustained hacking campaign is being dubbed, has attained the highest levels of system access of targets located in 16 countries total, according to a report published Tuesday by security firm Cylance. Compromised systems in the ongoing attacks include Active Directory domain controllers that store employee login credentials, servers running Microsoft Windows and Linux, routers, switches, and virtual private networks. With more than 50 victims that include airports, hospitals, telecommunications providers, chemical companies, and governments, the Iranian-backed hackers are reported to have extraordinary control over much of the world’s critical infrastructure. Cylance researchers wrote:

Perhaps the most bone-chilling evidence we collected in this campaign was the targeting and compromise of transportation networks and systems such as airlines and airports in South Korea, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The level of access seemed ubiquitous: Active Directory domains were fully compromised, along with entire Cisco Edge switches, routers, and internal networking infrastructure. Fully compromised VPN credentials meant their entire remote access infrastructure and supply chain was under the control of the Cleaver team, allowing permanent persistence under compromised credentials. They achieved complete access to airport gates and their security control systems, potentially allowing them to spoof gate credentials. They gained access to PayPal and Go Daddy credentials allowing them to make fraudulent purchases and allow[ing] unfettered access to the victim’s domains. We were witnessed [sic] a shocking amount of access into the deepest parts of these companies and the airports in which they operate.

Tuesday’s 86-page report relies on circumstantial evidence to arrive at the conclusion that the 20 or more hackers participating in Operation Cleaver are backed by Iran’s government. Members take Persian handles such as Salman Ghazikhani and Bahman Mohebbi; they work from numerous Internet domains, IP addresses, and autonomous system numbers registered in Iran; and many of the custom-configured hacking tools they use issue warnings when their external IP addresses trace back to the Middle Eastern country. The infrastructure supporting the vast campaign is too sprawling to be the work of a lone individual or small group; it could only have been sponsored by a nation state.

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Researchers Uncover Government Spy Tool Used to Hack Telecoms and Belgian Cryptographer

Researchers Uncover Government Spy Tool Used to Hack Telecoms and Belgian Cryptographer

Piecing together new information from various researchers, it’s clear the ‘Regin” malware is one of the most sophisticated nation-state spy tools ever found.

The post Researchers Uncover Government Spy Tool Used to Hack Telecoms and Belgian Cryptographer appeared first on WIRED.



Highly Advanced Backdoor Trojan Cased High-profile Targets for Years

Researchers have unearthed highly advanced malware they believe was developed by a wealthy nation-state to spy on a wide range of international targets in diverse industries, including hospitality, energy, airline, and research.

Backdoor Regin, as researchers at security firm Symantec are referring to the trojan, bears some resemblance to previously discovered state-sponsored malware, including the espionage trojans known as Flame and Duqu, as well as Stuxnet, the computer worm and trojan that was programmed to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program. Regin likely required months or years to be completed and contains dozens of individual modules that allowed its operators to tailor the malware to individual targets.

To remain stealthy, the malware is organized into five stages, each of which is encrypted except for the first one. Executing the first stage triggers a domino chain in which the second stage is decrypted and executed, and that in turn decrypts the third stage, and so on. Analyzing and understanding the malware requires researchers to acquire all five stages. Regin contains dozens of payloads, including code for capturing screenshots, seizing control of an infected computer’s mouse, stealing passwords, monitoring network traffic, and recovering deleted files. Other modules appear to be tailored to specific targets. One such payload included code for monitoring the traffic of a Microsoft IIS server. Another sniffed the traffic of mobile telephone base station controllers.

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This System Will Self Destruct: Crimeware Gets Powerful New Functions

Researchers have discovered new capabilities in the BlackEnergy crimeware tool that significantly extend its reach. The ability to run on network devices, steal digital certificates, and render infected computers unbootable are just a few of new-found weapons in its arsenal.

BlackEnergy emerged as a tool for launching denial-of-service attacks. It later morphed into crimeware used to funnel banking credentials and most recently was observed as a refitted piece of software for espionage that targeted the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Ukrainian and Polish government agencies, and a variety of sensitive European industries over the last year. In this last incarnation, BlackEnergy in some cases was installed by exploiting a previously unknown vulnerability in Microsoft Windows systems.

According to a report published Monday by security firm Kaspersky Labs, the breadth of BlackEnergy goes even further. A host of extensions customized for both Windows and Linux systems contain commands for carrying out DoS attacks, stealing passwords, scanning ports, logging IP sources, covertly taking screenshots, gaining persistent access to command and control channels, and destroying hard drives. Researchers Kurt Baumgartner and Maria Garnaeva also acquired a version that works on ARM- and MIPS-based systems and uncovered evidence BlackEnergy has infected networking devices manufactured by Cisco Systems. They are unsure precisely what the purpose is for some plugins, including one that gathers device instance IDs and other information on connected USB drives and another that collects details on the BIOS, motherboard, and processor of infected systems.

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