What are botnets downloading?
Spam mailshots with links to malware and bots downloading other malware are just a couple of botnet deployment scenarios. The choice of infectious payload is limited only by the imagination of the botnet operator or customer. It might be a ransomware, a banker, a miner, a backdoor, the list goes on, and you don’t need […] more…A Rising Trend: How Attackers are Using LNK Files to Download Malware
PowerShell is a versatile command-line and shell scripting language from Microsoft that can integrate and interact with a wide array of technologies. It runs discreetly in the background, and can be used to obtain system information without an executable file. All told, it makes an attractive tool for threat actors. There were a few notable instances […] more…Spam and phishing in Q1 2017
Spam: quarterly highlights Spam from the Necurs botnet We wrote earlier about a sharp increase in the amount of spam with malicious attachments, mainly Trojan encryptors. Most of that spam was coming from the Necurs botnet, which is currently considered the world’s largest spam botnet. However, in late December 2016, the network’s activity almost ceased […] more…Inside of the WASP’s nest: deep dive into PyPI-hosted malware
Photo by Matheus Queiroz on Unsplash In late 2022 we decided to start monitoring PyPI, arguably the most important Python repository, as there were a number of reports on it hosting malware. PyPI took exceptional relevance amongst all repositories as, historically, it was trusted by default by many software developers. Any security breach or abuse […] more…APT43: An investigation into the North Korean group’s cybercrime operations
Introduction As recently reported by our Mandiant’s colleagues, APT43 is a threat actor believed to be associated with North Korea. APT43’s main targets include governmental institutions, research groups, think tanks, business services, and the manufacturing sector, with most victims located in the United States and South Korea. The group uses a variety of techniques and […] more…New Android Spyware ActionSpy Revealed via Phishing Attacks from Earth Empusa
By Ecular Xu and Joseph C. Chen While tracking Earth Empura, also known as POISON CARP/Evil Eye, we identified an undocumented Android spyware we have named ActionSpy (detected by Trend Micro as AndroidOS_ActionSpy.HRX). During the first quarter of 2020, we observed Earth Empusa’s activity targeting users in Tibet and Turkey before they extended their scope […] more…IT threat evolution Q1 2020. Statistics
These statistics are based on detection verdicts for Kaspersky products received from users who consented to providing statistical data. Quarterly figures According to Kaspersky Security Network, Kaspersky solutions blocked 726,536,269 attacks launched from online resources in 203 countries across the globe. A total of 442,039,230 unique URLs were recognized as malicious by Web Anti-Virus components. […] more…More Than 8,000 Unsecured Redis Instances Found in the Cloud
By David Fiser (Security Researcher) We discovered 8,000 Redis instances that are running unsecured in different parts of the world, even ones deployed in public clouds. These Redis instances have been found without Transport Layer Security (TLS) encryption and are not password protected. Redis, according to its developers, is originally intended to be used only […] more…Malicious Optimizer and Utility Android Apps on Google Play Communicate with Trojans that Install Malware, Perform Mobile Ad Fraud
By Lorin Wu (Mobile Threats Analyst) We recently discovered several malicious optimizer, booster, and utility apps (detected by Trend Micro as AndroidOS_BadBooster.HRX) on Google Play that are capable of accessing remote ad configuration servers that can be used for malicious purposes, perform mobile ad fraud, and download as many as 3,000 malware variants or malicious […] more…Shedding Skin – Turla’s Fresh Faces
Turla, also known as Venomous Bear, Waterbug, and Uroboros, may be best known for what was at the time an “ultra complex” snake rootkit focused on NATO-related targets, but their malware set and activity is much broader. Our current focus is on more recent and upcoming activity from this APT, which brings an interesting mix […] more…New trends in the world of IoT threats
Cybercriminals’ interest in IoT devices continues to grow: in H1 2018 we picked up three times as many malware samples attacking smart devices as in the whole of 2017. And in 2017 there were ten times more than in 2016. That doesn’t bode well for the years ahead. We decided to study what attack vectors […] more…IT threat evolution Q2 2018. Statistics
Q2 figures According to KSN: Kaspersky Lab solutions blocked 962,947,023 attacks launched from online resources located in 187 countries across the globe. 351,913,075 unique URLs were recognized as malicious by Web Anti-Virus components. Attempted infections by malware designed to steal money via online access to bank accounts were logged on the computers of 215,762 users. […] more…OPC UA security analysis
This paper discusses our project that involved searching for vulnerabilities in implementations of the OPC UA protocol. In publishing this material, we hope to draw the attention of vendors that develop software for industrial automation systems and the industrial internet of things to problems associated with using such widely available technologies, which turned out to […] more…Cryptocurrency Web Miner Script Injected into AOL Advertising Platform
by Chaoying Liu and Joseph C. Chen On March 25, we saw that the number of cryptocurrency web miners detected by the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network suddenly spiked. Our team tracked the web miner traffic and found that the bulk of it was linked to MSN[.]com in Japan. Further analysis revealed that malicious actors […] more…Ztorg: money for infecting your smartphone
This research started when we discovered an infected Pokémon GO guide in Google Play. It was there for several weeks and was downloaded more than 500,000 times. We detected the malware as Trojan.AndroidOS.Ztorg.ad. After some searching, I found some other similar infected apps that were being distributed from the Google Play Store. The first of […] more…Lazarus Under The Hood
Download full report (PDF) In February 2017 an article in the Polish media broke the silence on a long-running story about attacks on banks, allegedly related to the notoriously known Lazarus Group. While the original article didn’t mention Lazarus Group it was quickly picked up by security researchers. Today we’d like to share some of […] more…More information
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