Research Saturday

Dr. Tudor Dumitras from University of Maryland joins Dave Bittner to share a research study conducted in collaboration with industry partners from Facebook, NortonLifeLock Research Group and EURECOM. The project is called: "When Malware Changed Its Mind: An Empirical Study of Variable Program Behaviors in the Real World." In the study, the team analyzed how malware samples change their behavior when executed on different hosts or at different times. Such “split personalities” may confound the current techniques for malware analysis and detection. Malware execution traces are typically collected by executing the samples in a controlled environment (a “sandbox”), and the techniques created and tested using such traces do not account for the broad range of behaviors observed in the wild. In the paper, the team shows how behavior variability can make those techniques appear more effective than they really are, and they make some recommendations for dealing with the variability.

The research and executive summary can be found here:

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Our guest Doel Santos, Threat Research Analyst at Palo Alto Networks, joins Dave Bittner to talk about Unit 42's work on "Ransomware Groups to Watch: Emerging Threats." As part of Unit 42’s commitment to stop ransomware attacks, they monitor the activity of existing groups, search for dark web leak sites and fresh onion sites, identify up-and-coming players and study tactics, techniques and procedures. During their operations, Unit 42 observed four emerging ransomware groups that are currently affecting organizations and show signs of having the potential to become more prevalent in the future. Doel discusses these (AvosLocker, Hive Ransomware, HelloKitty, and LockBit 2.0) with Dave.

The research can be found here:

• Ransomware Groups to Watch: Emerging Threats

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Guest Michael DeBolt, Chief Intelligence Officer from Intel471, joins Dave Bittner to discuss their work on "How Groove Gang is shaking up the Ransomware-as-a-Service market to empower affiliates." McAfee Enterprise ATR believes, with high confidence, that the Groove gang is associated with the Babuk gang, either as a former affiliate or subgroup. These cybercriminals are happy to put aside previous Ransomware-as-a-Service hierarchies to focus on the ill-gotten gains to be made from controlling victim’s networks, rather than the previous approach which prioritized control of the ransomware itself.

The research can be found here:

• How Groove Gang is shaking up the Ransomware-as-a-Service market to empower affiliates

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Matt Stafford, Senior Threat Intelligence Researcher, from Prevailion joins Dave to talk about their work on "Diving Deep into UNC1151’s Infrastructure: Ghostwriter and beyond." Prevailion’s Adversarial Counterintelligence Team (PACT) used advanced infrastructure hunting techniques and Prevailion’s visibility into threat actor infrastructure creation to uncover previously unknown domains associated with UNC1151 and the “Ghostwriter” influence campaign. UNC1151 is likely a state-backed threat actor waging an ongoing and far-reaching influence campaign that has targeted numerous countries across Europe. Their operations typically display messaging in general alignment with the security interests of the Russian Federation; their hallmarks include anti-NATO messaging, intimate knowledge of regional culture and politics, and strategic influence operations (such as hack-and-leak operations used in conjunction with fabricated messaging and/or forged documents). PACT assesses with varying degrees of confidence that there are 81 additional, unreported domains clustered with the activity that FireEye and ThreatConnect detailed in their respective reports. PACT also assesses with High Confidence that UNC1151 has targeted additional European entities outside of the Baltics, Poland, Ukraine and Germany, for which no previous public reporting exists.

The research can be found here:

• Diving Deep into UNC1151’s Infrastructure: Ghostwriter and beyond

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Dan Petro, Lead Researcher, and Allan Cecil, Security Consultant, from Bishop Fox join Dave to share their research "You're Doing IoT RNG," that they presented at DefCon 29. There’s a crack in the foundation of Internet of Things (IoT) security, one that affects 35 billion devices worldwide. Basically, every IoT device with a hardware random number generator (RNG) contains a serious vulnerability whereby it fails to properly generate random numbers, which undermines security for any upstream use. In order to perform most security-relevant operations, computers need to generate secrets via an RNG. These secrets then form the basis of cryptography, access controls, authentication, and more. The details of exactly how and why these secrets are generated varies for each use.

The research can be found here:

• You're Doing IoT RNG

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Guest Ariel Zelivansky, Senior Manager of Security Research at Palo Alto Networks, joins Dave to discuss Unit 42's work on the first cross-account container takeover in the public cloud. The Unit 42 Threat Intelligence team has identified the first known vulnerability that could enable one user of a public cloud service to break out of their environment and execute code on environments belonging to other users in the same public cloud service. This unprecedented cross-account takeover affected Microsoft's Azure Container-as-a-Service (CaaS) platform. Researchers named the finding Azurescape because the attack started from a container escape – a technique that enables privilege escalation out of container environments.

The research can be found here:

Note: Microsoft is a sponsor of the CyberWire, however, we cover them as we would any other company.

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Guest Jake Valletta, Director of Professional Services at Mandiant, joins Dave to talk about the critical vulnerability Mandiant disclosed that affects millions of IoT devices. Mandiant disclosed a critical risk vulnerability in coordination with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (“CISA”) that affects millions of IoT devices that use the ThroughTek “Kalay” network. This vulnerability, discovered by researchers on Mandiant’s Red Team in late 2020, would enable adversaries to remotely compromise victim IoT devices, resulting in the ability to listen to live audio, watch real time video data, and compromise device credentials for further attacks based on exposed device functionality. These further attacks could include actions that would allow an adversary to remotely control affected devices.

The research can be found here:

• Mandiant Discloses Critical Vulnerability Affecting Millions of IoT Devices

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Guest Jon Hencinski from Expel joins Dave Bittner to discuss his team's recent work on "Expel SOC Stops Ransomware Attack Aimed at WordPress CMS via Drive-By Download Disguised as Google Chrome Update."

In July, 2021, Expel's SOC stopped a ransomware attack at a large software and staffing company. The attackers compromised the company’s WordPress CMS and used the SocGholish framework to trigger a drive-by download of a Remote Access Tool (RAT) disguised as a Google Chrome update.

In total, four hosts downloaded a malicious Zipped JScript file that was configured to deploy a RAT, but we were able to stop the attack before ransomware deployment and help the organization remediate its WordPress CMS. Jon will walk us through what happened, how they caught it, and provide recommendations on how to secure your WordPress CMS. 

The research can be found here:

• Expel SOC Stops Ransomware Attack Aimed at WordPress CMS via Drive-By Download Disguised as Google Chrome Update

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Guest Ben Seri, Armis' VP of Research, joins Dave to talk about a set of remote code execution (RCE) vulnerabilities in the pneumatic tube system of Swisslog. Nine vulnerabilities in critical infrastructure used by 80% of major hospitals in North America.

Swisslog’s Translogic Pneumatic Tube System (PTS), a solution that plays a crucial role in patient care, found vulnerable to devastating attack. Dubbed PwnedPiper, the vulnerabilities allow for complete take over of the Translogic Nexus Control Panel, which powers all current models of Translogic PTS stations. Older IP-connected Translogic stations are also impacted, but are no longer supported by Swisslog.

The research can be found here:

• PwnedPiper

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Guest Deepen Desai, Zscaler's Chief Information Security Officer and VP Security Research & Operations, joins Dave to discuss their ThreatLabz team's research "Joker Joking in Google Play: Joker malware targets Google Play store with new tactics." Joker is one of the most prominent malware families targeting Android devices. Despite public awareness of this particular malware, it keeps finding its way into Google’s official application market by employing changes in its code, execution methods, or payload-retrieving techniques. This spyware is designed to steal SMS messages, contact lists, and device information, and to sign the victim up for premium wireless application protocol (WAP) services.

Zscaler’s ThreatLabz research team has been constantly monitoring the Joker malware. Recently, they observed regular uploads of it onto the Google Play store. ThreatLabz notified the Google Android Security team, who have taken prompt action to remove the suspicious apps from the Google Play store. 

This prompted them to evaluate how Joker is so successful at getting around the Google Play vetting process. The team saw 11 different samples regularly uploaded to Google Play recently clocking 30k installs.

The research can be found here:

• Joker Joking in Google Play: Joker malware targets Google Play store with new tactics

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