Microsoft's move last year to block macros by default in Office applications is forcing miscreants to find other tools with which to launch cyberattacks, including the software vendor's LNK files – the shortcuts Windows uses to point to other files.

Summary Three key takeaways from our analysis of Vidar infrastructure: Russian VPN gateways are potentially providing anonymity for Vidar operators / customers, making it more challenging for analysts to have a complete overview of this threat. These gateways now appear to be migrating to Tor. Vidar operators appear to be expanding their infrastructure, so analysts need to keep them in their sights. We expect a new wave of customers and as a result, an increase of campaigns in the upcoming weeks

A threat actor claims to be selling public and private data of 400 million Twitter users scraped in 2021 using a now-fixed API vulnerability. They're asking $200,000 for an exclusive sale.

Key Takeaways

• Nighthawk is an advanced C2 framework intended for red team operations through commercial licensing.
• Proofpoint researchers observed initial use of the framework in September 2022 by a likely red team.
• We have seen no indications at this time that leaked versions of Nighthawk are being used by attributed threat actors in the wild.
• The tool has a robust list of configurable evasion techniques that are referenced as “opsec” functions throughout its code.
  P* roofpoint researchers expect Nighthawk will show up in threat actor campaigns as the tool becomes more widely recognized or as threat actors search for new, more capable tools to use against targets.

Actions to take today to mitigate cyber threats from ransomware: • Install updates for operating systems, software, and firmware as soon as they are released. • Require phishing-resistant MFA for as many services as possible. • Train users to recognize and report phishing attempts.

The Russian government is planning “massive cyberattacks” against Ukrainian critical infrastructure facilities to “increase the effect of missile strikes on electrical supply facilities,” the Ukrainian government said Monday.

New domains and new behavioral indicators, but malware authors stick to tried and tested architecture despite Apple’s updates.

Cybereason GSOC observed distribution of the Bumblebee Loader and post-exploitation activities including privilege escalation, reconnaissance and credential theft. Bumblebee operators use the Cobalt Strike framework throughout the attack and abuse credentials for privilege escalation to access Active Directory, as well as abusing a domain administrator account to move laterally, create local user accounts and exfiltrate data...

CHARGING MY LASER! Since the first quarter of 2022, there has been a significant increase in hacktivism worldwide.

Unusually resourced threat actor has targeted multiple companies in recent days.

In June 2022, FortiGuard Labs encountered IoT malware samples with SSH-related strings, something not often seen in other IoT threat campaigns. What piqued our interest more was the size of the code referencing these strings in relation to the code used for DDoS attacks, which usually comprises most of the code in other variants.

SEKOIA.IO presents its Ransomware threat landscape for the first semester of 2022, with the following key points:

• Ransomware victimology – recent evolutions
• A busy first half of the year – several newcomers in the ransomware neighborhood
• Cross-platform ransomware features trend
• New extortion techniques
• State-nexus groups carrying out ransomware campaigns
• Ransomware threat groups’ Dark Web activities
• A shift towards extortion without encryption?

LockBit remained the most active threat in June, and “the costliest strain of ransomware ever documented” went dark while others surged.

Unveiling an unknown APT actor attacking high-profile entities in Europe and Asia

ToddyCat is a relatively new APT actor that we have not been able to relate to other known actors, responsible for multiple sets of attacks detected since December 2020 against high-profile entities in Europe and Asia. We still have little information about this actor, but we know that its main distinctive signs are two formerly unknown tools that we call ‘Samurai backdoor’ and ‘Ninja Trojan’.

Earlier this year Malwarebytes released its 2022 Threat Review, a review of the most important threats and cybersecurity trends of 2021, and what they could mean for 2022. Among other things it covers the year’s alarming rebound in malware detections, and a significant shift in the balance of email threats.

Symbiote is a new Linux malware we discovered that acts in a parasitic nature, infecting other running processes to inflict damage on machines.

The activity we have observed has been attributed to a threat group that Microsoft tracks as DEV-0537, also known as LAPSUS$. DEV-0537 is known for using a pure extortion and destruction model without deploying ransomware payloads.

Online security is extremely important for people in Ukraine and the surrounding region right now. Government agencies, independent newspapers and public service providers need it to function and individuals need to communicate safely. Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been working around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.

Apple's Airtags are an ingenious technology: they fuse every Ios device into a sensor grid that logs the location of each tag, using clever cryptography to prevent anyone but the tag's owner from pulling that information out of the system.

But there are significant problems with Airtags' privacy model. Some of these are unique to Apple, others are shared by all Bluetooth location systems, including Covid exposure-notification apps and Airtag rivals like Tile.