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New China-Aligned Hackers Hit State and Telecom Sectors

Phantom Taurus is a previously undocumented nation-state actor whose espionage operations align with People’s Republic of China (PRC) state interests. Over the past two and a half years, Unit 42 researchers have observed Phantom Taurus targeting government and telecommunications organizations across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Our observations show that Phantom Taurus’ main focus areas include ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, geopolitical events and military operations. The group’s primary objective is espionage. Its attacks demonstrate stealth, persistence and an ability to quickly adapt their tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs). What sets Phantom Taurus apart from other actors in the Chinese advanced persistent threat (APT) nexus is its distinctive set of TTPs.…

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China-linked hacking group Phantom Taurus targeting embassies, foreign ministries
China-linked hacking group Phantom Taurus targeting embassies, foreign ministries Espionage hackers aligned with China are targeting foreign ministries, embassies and telcos across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, researchers have found. Palo Alto Network’s Unit 42 has been observing a previously undocumented nation-state hacking group that it dubbed Phantom Taurus targeting government and telecommunications organizations with the goal of obtaining information connected to geopolitical events and military operations. The group has been operating for about two-and-a-half years. Unit 42 said Phantom Taurus stood out because of the distinctive tactics used to conduct “highly covert operations and maintain long-term access to critical targets.” The company has been tracking the group’s activity since June 2023, observing a trail of attacks that allowed hackers to obtain sensitive, non-public information from multiple governments. The hackers target technology providers to government entities, allowing them to pilfer diplomatic communications, defense-related intelligence and the operations of critical governmental ministries. Unit 42 found that the timing of cyberattacks launched by the group typically lined up with major global events or regional incidents. The researchers did not say which countries were targeted. NET-STAR malware Phantom Taurus has been seen using operational infrastructure used by other known Chinese groups like APT27, Winnti, and Mustang Panda. But Phantom Taurus has separated itself from other Chinese espionage groups by using a new suite of malware and employing comparatively more evolved tactics, according to Unit 42. They have deployed a mix of commonly used Chinese malware like China Chopper while also using new customized hacking tools the researchers named NET-STAR. The group has evolved in the last two years, moving from targeting emails held within servers to now stealing full databases of information. Much of Unit 42’s report focuses on the new suite of malware designed to target Internet Information Services (IIS) web servers — software from Microsoft used for hosting material online. The NET-STAR malware “demonstrates Phantom Taurus’ advanced evasion techniques and a deep understanding of .NET architecture, representing a significant threat to internet-facing servers.” The suite consists of three backdoors that each serve different roles in the attack chain, allowing the hackers to access databases, evade antivirus solutions, and more. One script used for stealing databases was deployed in attacks targeting information on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Lauren Rucker, a cybersecurity expert at Deepwatch, said the NET-STAR tools are exceptionally difficult to detect because the malware “leaves no footprint for traditional antivirus to find and was designed to actively blind modern security solutions like [Endpoint Detection and Response] by disabling critical Windows security monitoring features.” Chinese APT groups have long targeted foreign ministries and embassies in a variety of ways over the last decade. In addition to longstanding attacks on U.S. diplomats, Chinese groups have been accused of attacking governments and embassies in Sweden, France, the U.K., Ukraine, Hungary, Singapore, the Czech Republic, Japan, Lithuania, multiple Southeast Asian countries and several Pacific islands. Jonathan Greig is a Breaking News Reporter at Recorded Future News. Jonathan has worked across the globe as a journalist since 2014. Before moving back to New York City, he worked for news outlets in South Africa, Jordan and Cambodia. He previously covered cybersecurity at ZDNet and TechRepublic.
therecord.mediaOct 1, 2025extracted
Chinese APT ‘Phantom Taurus’ Targeting Organizations With Net-Star Malware
A Chinese state-sponsored hacking group tracked as ‘Phantom Taurus’ has been targeting government and telecommunications organizations for espionage for more than two years, Palo Alto Networks reports. Initially observed in 2023, the APT was only recently linked to Chinese hacking groups through shared infrastructure, as its tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) differ from those typically associated with threat actors operating out of China. “These enable the group to conduct highly covert operations and maintain long-term access to critical targets,” says Palo Alto Networks. The group, the cybersecurity firm explains, uses shared operational infrastructure exclusive to Chinese APTs, and targets high-value organizations (such as ministries of foreign affairs and embassies), in line with China’s economic and geopolitical interests. What sets Phantom Taurus apart, however, is the use of a different set of TTPs, some unique to the group, such as its Specter and Net-Star malware families, and the Ntospy malware. Tools typically used by Chinese hackers, such as China Chopper, the Potato suite, and Impacket, are also part of its inventory. The APT has been observed targeting email servers to exfiltrate messages of interest, as well as directly targeting databases, in attacks against organizations in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. In 2025, the group started using Net-Star, a .NET malware suite targeting IIS web servers, which consists of three web-based backdoors: IIServerCore (a fileless backdoor) and two AssemblyExecuter variants (.NET malware loaders). The IIServerCore backdoor operates entirely in memory. It can receive and execute payloads and arguments, and can send the result to the command-and-control (C&C) server. It supports built-in commands to perform file system operations, access databases, execute arbitrary code, manage web shells, evade and bypass security solutions, load payloads directly in memory, and encrypt communication with the C&C. The first malware loader, AssemblyExecuter V1, can execute other .NET assemblies in memory, allowing the attackers to dynamically load and execute additional code post-compromise. AssemblyExecuter V2 has the same core purpose, but features enhanced evasion capabilities, with dedicated methods for bypassing Windows’s Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) and Event Tracing for Windows (ETW) security mechanisms. “We observed that the group takes an interest in diplomatic communications, defense-related intelligence and the operations of critical governmental ministries. The timing and scope of the group’s operations frequently coincide with major global events and regional security affairs,” Palo Alto Networks says. Related: Cyber Founder Recipe for Success: Clear Vision and Trusted Experts
securityweek.comOct 1, 2025extracted
New China-Aligned Hackers Hit State and Telecom Sectors
A newly identified cyber espionage group has been targeting government and telecommunications organizations across Africa, the Middle East and Asia for at least the past two and a half years, according to Palo Alto Networks. The group was tracked as activity cluster CL-STA-0043 by Palo Alto’s Unit 42 research team in 2022 and 2023. In 2024, it was allocated its own temporary group classification, TGR-STA-0043, and campaign codename, Operation Diplomatic Specter. In a new report, published on September 30, 2025, Unit 42 researchers elevated TGR-STA-00043 to a distinct threat group under the name Phantom Taurus. As part of its cyber-espionage campaigns, the group has targeted ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, geopolitical events and military operations. Its activity aligns with Chinese state interests. Phantom Taurus: Targeting and Attack Techniques According to the Unit 42 report, Phantom Taurus typically conducts long-term intelligence collection operations against high-value targets to obtain sensitive, non-public information. The group takes a specific interest in diplomatic communications, defense-related intelligence and the operations of critical governmental ministries, with campaigns that frequently coincide with major global events and regional security affairs. While Phantom Taurus previously focused on exfiltrating sensitive emails from compromised email servers, the group has recently pivoted to directly targeting SQL Server databases for data theft. The group’s operations now involve a custom batch script (mssq.bat), which they execute remotely via Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to query and extract information from databases. The script operates as follows: Authenticating to the SQL Server using the system administrator account and a pre-compromised password Dynamically executing queries supplied by the operators (e.g., searching for tables/keywords related to specific countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan) Exporting results to CSV files for exfiltration before closing the connection This tactical shift suggests an expanded focus on structured data repositories, likely to harvest intelligence or sensitive documents more efficiently than email-based theft alone. Using WMI for remote execution further highlights the group’s reliance on living-off-the-land (LotL) techniques to evade detection. Phantom Taurus uses an operational infrastructure that has exclusively been used by Chinese threat actors, including Iron Taurus (aka APT27), Starchy Taurus and Stately Taurus (aka Mustang Panda). However, the specific infrastructure components used by Phantom Taurus have not been observed in operations by other threat actors, indicating operational compartmentalization within this shared ecosystem. Additionally, Phantom Taurus uses a unique set of techniques, tactics and procedures (TTPs), that makes it stand out from other groups. Alongside common tools such as China Chopper, the Potato suite and Impacket, the group uses some tools and techniques that have never been observed in operations by other groups and others that have very rarely been used by other threat actors. These include the Specter malware family, Ntospy and NET-STAR, a newly identified malware suite. NET-STAR, A New Custom-Made Malware Suite The Unit 42 report shared findings on an undocumented .NET malware suite deployed by Phantom Taurus to target Internet Information Services (IIS) web servers. This newly identified tool, dubbed NET-STAR by the security researchers based on the use of the string in the malware’s program database (PDB) paths, “demonstrates Phantom Taurus’ advanced evasion techniques and a deep understanding of .NET architecture,” noted the Unit 42 report. The suite comprises three distinct web-based backdoors, each serving a specific role in the attack chain while maintaining persistence within the target’s IIS environment: IIServerCore: a fileless modular backdoor that supports in-memory execution of command-line arguments, arbitrary commands and payloads AssemblyExecuter V1: an older version of custom-made .NET assembly designed for a single, specific purpose of executing other .NET assemblies directly in memory without writing them to disk (used by Phantom Taurus in 2024 campaigns) AssemblyExecuter V2: a new, enhanced version of AssemblyExecuter V1 equipped with Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) and Event Tracing for Windows (ETW) bypass capabilities (used by Phantom Taurus since early 2025)
infosecurity-magazine.comOct 1, 2025extracted
Phantom Taurus: A New Chinese Nexus APT and the Discovery of the NET-STAR Malware Suite
Phantom Taurus is a previously undocumented nation-state actor whose espionage operations align with People’s Republic of China (PRC) state interests. Over the past two and a half years, Unit 42 researchers have observed Phantom Taurus targeting government and telecommunications organizations across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Our observations show that Phantom Taurus’ main focus areas include ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, geopolitical events and military operations. The group’s primary objective is espionage. Its attacks demonstrate stealth, persistence and an ability to quickly adapt their tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs). What sets Phantom Taurus apart from other actors in the Chinese advanced persistent threat (APT) nexus is its distinctive set of TTPs. These enable the group to conduct highly covert operations and maintain long-term access to critical targets. This article sheds more light on the threat actor’s recently observed TTPs and reveals a previously undocumented custom tool in Phantom Taurus’ arsenal called NET-STAR. We published our first article about this activity cluster (originally tracked as CL-STA-0043) in June 2023. In May 2024, we promoted the classification of this cluster to a temporary group, which we designated TGR-STA-0043 and nicknamed Operation Diplomatic Specter. Our ongoing investigations into this group deepened our understanding of the threat actor’s operations and enabled us to determine its connection to the Chinese nexus. This rare level of insight reflects the depth and duration of our investigation. After sustained observation and intelligence collection over the past year, we have accumulated sufficient evidence to classify the temporary group as a new threat actor. Our attribution and cluster maturation process is based on Unit 42’s attribution framework. Figure 1 shows the process of promoting Phantom Taurus from a cluster of activity to a formally named threat actor. Figure 1 shows the process of promoting Phantom Taurus from a cluster of activity to a formally named threat actor. Palo Alto Networks customers are better protected from the threats discussed above through the following products and services: If you think you might have been compromised or have an urgent matter, contact the Unit 42 Incident Response team. Phantom Taurus is a Chinese APT group that conducts long-term intelligence collection operations against high-value targets to obtain sensitive, non-public information. The group primarily targets government entities and government service providers across the Middle East, Africa and Asia. The targeting patterns align consistently with the People's Republic of China (PRC) economic and geopolitical interests. We observed that the group takes an interest in diplomatic communications, defense-related intelligence and the operations of critical governmental ministries. The timing and scope of the group’s operations frequently coincide with major global events and regional security affairs. Our technical analysis reveals that the group employs a unique set of custom-developed tools and implements techniques that are rarely observed in the threat landscape. The list of TTPs is provided in Appendix A. This group's distinctive modus operandi, combined with its advanced operational practices, sets Phantom Taurus apart from other Chinese APT groups. The designation of this group as a distinct Chinese APT is supported by multiple attribution factors, as illustrated in the Diamond Model of attribution [PDF] shown in Figure 2. We established the attribution of Phantom Taurus through a comprehensive analysis of the following Diamond Model elements: Infrastructure: Phantom Taurus uses a shared Chinese APT operational infrastructure that has been exclusively used by Chinese threat actors, including Iron Taurus (aka APT27), Starchy Taurus (aka Winnti) and Stately Taurus (aka Mustang Panda). However, the specific infrastructure components used by Phantom Taurus have not been observed in operations by other threat actors, indicating operational compartmentalization within this shared ecosystem. Victimology: The group consistently targets high-value organizations that have access to sensitive non-public information. Over the past several years, we have observed Phantom Taurus targeting government and telecommunications sector organizations, particularly those that provide services and infrastructure. This group focuses its operations on the Middle East, Africa and Asia, reflecting intelligence collection priorities that align with Chinese strategic interests. Capabilities: Phantom Taurus employs a set of TTPs that differentiate it from other threat actors. Several of these techniques have not been observed in operations by other groups, while others are sufficiently rare that only a handful of actors have been observed using similar methods. In addition to common tools such as China Chopper, the Potato suite and Impacket, the group uses customized tools, including the Specter malware family, Ntospy and the NET-STAR malware suite described later in this article. By using the Diamond Model of attribution with the three nodes shown in Figure 2, we mapped the group’s similarities and overlaps with other threat actors. As we tracked the activity for an extended period, it became clear that the activities that we observed were carried out by a new threat actor. Our continuous monitoring of Phantom Taurus activities has revealed a tactical evolution that we first observed in early 2025. Since 2023, Phantom Taurus has focused on stealing sensitive and specific emails of interest from email servers, as we described in a previous article. However, our telemetry indicates a shift from this email-centric methodology to the direct targeting of databases. We observed Phantom Taurus using a script named mssq.bat to connect to and collect data from a targeted database. The mssq.bat script operates in the following manner: Connects to an SQL Server database with a given server name, a user ID named sa (system administrator) and a password that the attackers previously obtained Reads the SQL query provided in the command-line arguments by the group’s operators. This allows dynamic searching for tables and specific keywords Executes the provided query and returns the results that match the user’s search Exports results to a CSV file Closes the database connection The threat actor leveraged Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to execute the mssq.bat script on the remote SQL Server. Figure 3 shows that the command contains both the embedded script and the execution instructions. The threat actor used this method to search for documents of interest and information related to specific countries such as Afghanistan and Pakistan. In addition to Phantom Taurus’ shift to collecting data from databases, we observed the group using a new and undocumented malware suite in its recent operations. This new tool is a .NET malware suite designed to target Internet Information Services (IIS) web servers. We named the suite NET-STAR, based on the use of the string in the malware’s program database (PDB) paths: C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\tmp\NETstarshard\ServerCore\obj\Release\ServerCore.pdb C:\Users\admin\Desktop\starshard\NETstarshard\ExecuteAssembly\obj\Debug\ExecuteAssembly.pdb The STAR string also appears as a delimiter in Base64-encoded data. The NET-STAR malware suite demonstrates Phantom Taurus’ advanced evasion techniques and a deep understanding of .NET architecture, representing a significant threat to internet-facing servers. The suite consists of three distinct web-based backdoors, each serving a specific role in the attack chain while maintaining persistence within the target’s IIS environment: IIServerCore: A fileless modular backdoor that supports in-memory execution of command-line arguments, arbitrary commands and payloads AssemblyExecuter V1: Loads and executes additional .NET payloads in memory AssemblyExecuter V2: An enhanced version of AssemblyExecuter V1 that is also equipped with Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) and Event Tracing for Windows (ETW) bypass capabilities IIServerCore is the main web-based backdoor component in the NET-STAR malware suite. After being loaded by the web shell loader component, the backdoor operates entirely in memory within the w3wp.exe IIS worker process. The IIServerCore backdoor has a unique modular, fileless execution flow that allows it to: Receive additional payloads and arguments Execute them in memory Send the results in an encrypted command and control (C2) communication channel Figure 4 shows the execution flow. The initial component of IIServerCore is an ASPX web shell named OutlookEN.aspx. This web shell contains an embedded Base64-compressed binary, the IIServerCore backdoor. When the web shell executes, it loads the backdoor into the memory of the w3wp.exe process and invokes the Run method, which is the main function of IIServerCore. Figure 5 shows the web shell. In an attempt to evade detection efforts, the threat actor timestomped the ASPX file to match the timestamp of another old ASPX file found on the operating system. The threat actor timestomped not only the web shell, but also the backdoors in the NET-STAR malware suite. The actor changed the compilation time to a random future date to hide the malware’s real compilation timestamp. IIServerCore also supports a command called changeLastModified. This suggests that the malware has active timestomping capabilities, designed to confuse security analysts and digital forensics tools. The IIServerCore backdoor consists of a class called ServerRun and 11 methods. This includes a main method named Run as well as several others that provide additional capabilities. The methods and their descriptions are listed in Appendix B. The main method, Run, receives the incoming communication and handles all malware operations. This method processes two types of requests: Initial handshake requests to establish a session with the C2 server Subsequent command execution requests to load and execute .NET assemblies dynamically Figure 6 shows the Run method. The Run method manages the session state using cookies. This behavior allows the method to track and maintain information about a user’s session across multiple web requests. It decrypts incoming commands and payloads, loads .NET code from Base64-encoded assemblies and supports data encryption. The backdoor supports various built-in commands that provide a wide range of functionalities, including: File system operations Database access, including running SQL commands Arbitrary code execution Web shell management to deploy and manage multiple web shells Antivirus evasion: AMSI bypass functionality Encrypted C2 communication, where all communications are AES encrypted Memory-only execution: payloads are loaded directly into memory The full list of commands is provided in Appendix C. The second component in the NET-STAR suite is another .NET IIS malware that we named AssemblyExecuter. During our investigation, we observed two versions of AssemblyExecuter: An older version (v1) that we believe the threat actors initially used around 2024 A newer version (v2) that we believe they used in 2025 The first AssemblyExecuter version is a .NET assembly designed for a single, specific purpose of executing other .NET assemblies directly in memory without writing them to disk. This component enables threat actors to dynamically load and execute additional functionality after a compromise. The backdoor accepts assembly bytecode as input parameters, loads it using the .NET Assembly.Load() method and invokes the assembly’s entry point along with specified command-line arguments. The component’s seemingly benign code structure results in minimal flagging by antivirus engines on VirusTotal, at the time of writing this article. This demonstrates a technique that threat actors can use to create tools that avoid overt code, which detection systems might interpret as malicious. The second AssemblyExecuter version maintains the same core purpose as its predecessor, executing arbitrary .NET assemblies directly in memory. This version has enhanced evasion capabilities to operate in more heavily monitored environments. While the fundamental assembly loading and execution logic remain unchanged, AssemblyExecuter v2 includes dedicated methods for bypassing two critical Windows security mechanisms, AMSI and ETW. The malware dynamically determines which bypass techniques to apply based on input parameters, allowing attackers to selectively disable security controls, depending on the target environment’s configuration. Figure 7 displays the input parameters that the attackers used to achieve bypass. This article details the maturation of activity cluster CL-STA-0043 to a formally designated threat actor, Phantom Taurus. We also provide a detailed technical analysis of NET-STAR, a previously undiscovered malware suite that represents a significant evolution in this actor's operational capabilities. The extensive evidence that we gathered provides crucial insights into adversary persistence, adaptability, evolution process and strategic intent that short-term analysis cannot always capture. The formal designation of Phantom Taurus demonstrates the value of sustained threat actor tracking. Our multi-year investigation exemplifies how long-term monitoring enables a comprehensive understanding of threat actor evolution and operational capabilities. Palo Alto Networks customers are better protected from the threats discussed above through the following products: The Advanced WildFire machine-learning models and analysis techniques have been reviewed and updated in light of the indicators shared in this research. Advanced Threat Prevention has an inbuilt machine learning-based detection that can detect exploits in real time. Cortex XDR and XSIAM. - The XDR agent is designed to protect against the initial NET-STAR malware loader, preventing the execution of the attack chain outlined in this article. - Figure 8 shows that the execution of the loader component was detected and prevented by the web shell protection module. If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call: North America: Toll Free: +1 (866) 486-4842 (866.4.UNIT42) UK: +44.20.3743.3660 Europe and Middle East: +31.20.299.3130 Asia: +65.6983.8730 Japan: +81.50.1790.0200 Australia: +61.2.4062.7950 India: 000 800 050 45107 Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA) members. CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors. Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance. SHA256 hash for IIServerCore (ServerCore.dll) eeed5530fa1cdeb69398dc058aaa01160eab15d4dcdcd6cb841240987db284dc SHA256 hash for AssemblyExecuter V1 (ExecuteAssembly.dll) 3e55bf8ecaeec65871e6fca4cb2d4ff2586f83a20c12977858348492d2d0dec4 SHA256 hash for AssemblyExecuter V2 (ExecuteAssembly.dll) afcb6289a4ef48bf23bab16c0266f765fab8353d5e1b673bd6e39b315f83676e b76e243cf1886bd0e2357cbc7e1d2812c2c0ecc5068e61d681e0d5cff5b8e038 UNMASKED: Inside a New Chinese Nexus APT – Webinar, Palo Alto Networks Operation Diplomatic Specter: An Active Chinese Cyberespionage Campaign Leverages Rare Tool Set to Target Governmental Entities in the Middle East, Africa and Asia – Unit 42, Palo Alto Networks Through the Cortex XDR Lens: Uncovering a New Activity Group Targeting Governments in the Middle East and Africa – Palo Alto Networks Blog New Tool Set Found Used Against Organizations in the Middle East, Africa and the US – Unit 42, Palo Alto Networks Table 1. Phantom Taurus main TTPs. Table 2. List of IIServerCore’s methods. The following commands are embedded in the IIServerCore backdoor: fileExist listDir createDir renameDir fileRead deleteFile Dictionary createFile changeLastModified code_self code_pid run_code addshell bypassPrecompiledApp listShell removeShell executeSQLQuery ExecuteNonQuery
unit42.paloaltonetworks.comSep 30, 2025extracted
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Analyzing Sharepoint Exploits (CVE-2025-53770, CVE-2025-53771), (Wed, Jul 23rd)
On July 19–20, 2025, various security companies and national CERTs published alerts about active exploitation of on-premise SharePoint servers. According to the reports, observed attacks did not require authentication, allowed attackers to gain full control over the infected servers, and were performed using an exploit chain of two vulnerabilities: CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, publicly named “ToolShell”. Additionally, on the same dates, Microsoft released out-of-band security patches for the vulnerabilities CVE-2025-53770 and CVE-2025-53771, aimed at addressing the security bypasses of previously issued fixes for CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706. The release of the new, “proper” updates has caused confusion about exactly which vulnerabilities attackers are exploiting and whether they are using zero-day exploits. Kaspersky products proactively detected and blocked malicious activity linked to these attacks, which allowed us to gather statistics about the timeframe and spread of this campaign. Our statistics show that widespread exploitation started on July 18, 2025, and attackers targeted servers across the world in Egypt, Jordan, Russia, Vietnam, and Zambia. Entities across multiple sectors were affected: government, finance, manufacturing, forestry, and agriculture. While analyzing all artifacts related to these attacks, which were detected by our products and public information provided by external researchers, we found a dump of a POST request that was claimed to contain the malicious payload used in these attacks. After performing our own analysis, we were able to confirm that this dump indeed contained the malicious payload detected by our technologies, and that sending this single request to an affected SharePoint installation was enough to execute the malicious payload there. Our analysis of the exploit showed that it did rely on vulnerabilities fixed under CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, but by changing just one byte in the request, we were able to bypass those fixes. In this post, we provide detailed information about CVE-2025-49704, CVE-2025-49706, CVE-2025-53770, CVE-2025-53771, and one related vulnerability. Since the exploit code is already published online, is very easy to use, and poses a significant risk, we encourage all organizations to install the necessary updates. The exploit Our research started with an analysis of a POST request dump associated with this wave of attacks on SharePoint servers. We can see that this POST request targets the “/_layouts/15/ToolPane.aspx” endpoint and embeds two parameters: “MSOtlPn_Uri” and “MSOtlPn_DWP”. Looking at the code of ToolPane.aspx, we can see that this file itself does not contain much functionality and most of its code is located in the ToolPane class of the Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages namespace in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. Looking at this class reveals the code that works with the two parameters present in the exploit. However, accessing this endpoint under normal conditions is not possible without bypassing authentication on the attacked SharePoint server. This is where the first Microsoft SharePoint Server Spoofing Vulnerability CVE-2025-49706 comes into play. CVE-2025-49706 This vulnerability is present in the method PostAuthenticateRequestHandler, in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. SharePoint requires Internet Information Services (IIS) to be configured in integrated mode. In this mode, the IIS and ASP.NET authentication stages are unified. As a result, the outcome of IIS authentication is not determined until the PostAuthenticateRequest stage, at which point both the ASP.NET and IIS authentication methods have been completed. Therefore, the PostAuthenticateRequestHandler method utilizes a series of flags to track potential authentication violations. A logic bug in this method enables an authentication bypass if the “Referrer” header of the HTTP request is equal to “/_layouts/SignOut.aspx”, “/_layouts/14/SignOut.aspx”, or “/_layouts/15/SignOut.aspx” using case insensitive comparison. The code displayed in the image above handles the sign-out request and is also triggered when the sign-out page is specified as the referrer. When flag6 is set to false and flag7 is set to true, both conditional branches that could potentially throw an “Unauthorized Access” exception are bypassed. On July 8, 2025, Microsoft released an update that addressed this vulnerability by introducing additional checks to detect the usage of the “ToolPane.aspx” endpoint with the sign-out page specified as the referrer. The added check uses case insensitive comparison to verify if the requested path ends with “ToolPane.aspx”. Is it possible to bypass this check, say, by using a different endpoint? Our testing has shown that this check can be easily bypassed. CVE-2025-53771 We were able to successfully bypass the patch for vulnerability CVE-2025-49706 by adding just one byte to the exploit POST request. All that was required to bypass this patch was to add a “/” (slash) to the end of the requested “ToolPane.aspx” path. On July 20, 2025, Microsoft released an update that fixed this bypass as CVE-2025-53771. This fix replaces the “ToolPane.aspx” check to instead check whether the requested path is in the list of paths allowed for use with the sign-out page specified as the referrer. This allowlist includes the following paths: “/_layouts/15/SignOut.aspx”, “/_layouts/15/1033/initstrings.js”, “/_layouts/15/init.js”, “/_layouts/15/theming.js”, “/ScriptResource.axd”, “/_layouts/15/blank.js”, “/ScriptResource.axd”, “/WebResource.axd”, “/_layouts/15/1033/styles/corev15.css”, “/_layouts/15/1033/styles/error.css”, “/_layouts/15/images/favicon.ico”, “/_layouts/15/1033/strings.js”, “/_layouts/15/core.js”, and it can contain additional paths added by the administrator. While testing the CVE-2025-49706 bypass with the July 8, 2025 updates installed on our SharePoint debugging stand, we noticed some strange behavior. Not only did the bypass of CVE-2025-49706 work, but the entire exploit chain did! But wait! Didn’t the attackers use an additional Microsoft SharePoint Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2025-49704, which was supposed to be fixed in the same update? To understand why the entire exploit chain worked in our case, let’s take a look at the vulnerability CVE-2025-49704 and how it was fixed. CVE-2025-49704 CVE-2025-49704 is an untrusted data deserialization vulnerability that exists due to improper validation of XML content. Looking at the exploit POST request, we can see that it contains two URL encoded parameters: “MSOtlPn_Uri” and “MSOtlPn_DWP”. We can see how they are handled by examining the code of the method GetPartPreviewAndPropertiesFromMarkup in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. A quick analysis reveals that “MSOtlPn_Uri” is a page URL that might be pointing to an any file in the CONTROLTEMPLATES folder and the parameter “MSOtlPn_DWP” contains something known as WebPart markup. This markup contains special directives that can be used to execute safe controls on a server and has a format very similar to XML. While this “XML” included in the “MSOtlPn_DWP” parameter does not itself contain a vulnerability, it allows attackers to instantiate the ExcelDataSet control from Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Client.dll with CompressedDataTable property set to malicious payload and trigger its processing using DataTable property getter. Looking at the code of the ExcelDataSet’s DataTable property getter in Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Client.dll, we find the method GetObjectFromCompressedBase64String, responsible for deserialization of CompressedDataTable property contents. The data provided as Base64 string is decoded, unzipped, and passed to the BinarySerialization.Deserialize method from Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. Attackers use this method to provide a malicious DataSet whose deserialized content is shown in the image above. It contains an XML with an element of dangerous type "System.Collections.Generic.List1[[System.Data.Services.Internal.ExpandedWrapper2[...], System.Data.Services, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089]]", which allows attackers to execute arbitrary methods with the help of the well-known ExpandedWrapper technique aimed at exploitation of unsafe XML deserialization in applications based on the .NET framework. In fact, this shouldn’t be possible, since BinarySerialization.Deserialize in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll uses a special XmlValidator designed to protect against this technique by checking the types of all elements present in the provided XML and ensuring that they are on the list of allowed types. However, the exploit bypasses this check by placing the ExpandedWrapper object into the list. Now, to find out why the exploit worked on our SharePoint debugging stand with the July 8, 2025 updates installed, let’s take a look at how this vulnerability was fixed. In this patch, Microsoft did not really fix the vulnerability but only mitigated it by adding the new AddExcelDataSetToSafeControls class to the Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade namespace. This class contains new code that modifies the web.config file and marks the Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.ExcelDataSet control as unsafe. Because SharePoint does not execute this code on its own after installing updates, the only way to achieve the security effect was to manually run a configuration upgrade using the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard tool. Notably, the security guidance for CVE-2025-49704 does not mention the need for this step, which means at least some SharePoint administrators may skip it. Meanwhile, anyone who installed this update but did not manually perform a configuration upgrade remained vulnerable. CVE-2025-53770 On July 20, 2025, Microsoft released an update with a proper fix for the CVE-2025-49704 vulnerability. This patch introduces an updated XmlValidator that now properly validates element types in XML, preventing exploitation of this vulnerability without requiring a configuration upgrade and, more importantly, addressing the root cause and preventing exploitation of the same vulnerability through controls other than Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.ExcelDataSet. CVE-2020-1147 Readers familiar with previous SharePoint exploits might feel that the vulnerability CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770 and the exploit used by the attackers looks very familiar and very similar to the older .NET Framework, SharePoint Server, and Visual Studio Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2020-1147. In fact, if we compare the exploit for CVE-2020-1147 and an exploit for CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770, we can see that they are almost identical. The only difference is that in the exploit for CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770, the dangerous ExpandedWrapper object is placed in the list. This makes CVE-2025-53770 an updated fix for CVE-2020-1147. Conclusions Despite the fact that patches for the ToolShell vulnerabilities are now available for deployment, we assess that this chain of exploits will continue being used by attackers for a long time. We have been observing the same situation with other notorious vulnerabilities, such as ProxyLogon, PrintNightmare, or EternalBlue. While they have been known for years, many threat actors still continue leveraging them in their attacks to compromise unpatched systems. We expect the ToolShell vulnerabilities to follow the same fate, as they can be exploited with extremely low effort and allow full control over the vulnerable server. To stay better protected against threats like ToolShell, we as a community should learn lessons from previous events in the industry related to critical vulnerabilities. Specifically, the speed of applying security patches nowadays is the most important factor when it comes to fighting such vulnerabilities. Since public exploits for these dangerous vulnerabilities appear very soon after vulnerability announcements, it is paramount to install patches as soon as possible, as a gap of even a few hours can make a critical difference. At the same time, it is important to protect enterprise networks against zero-day exploits, which can be leveraged when there is no available public patch for vulnerabilities. In this regard, it is critical to equip machines with reliable cybersecurity solutions that have proven effective in combatting ToolShell attacks before they were publicly disclosed. Kaspersky Next with its Behaviour detection component proactively protects against exploitation of these vulnerabilities. Additionally, it is able to detect exploitation and the subsequent malicious activity. Kaspersky products detect the exploits and malware used in these attacks with the following verdicts: UDS:DangerousObject.Multi.Generic PDM:Exploit.Win32.Generic PDM:Trojan.Win32.Generic HEUR:Trojan.MSIL.Agent.gen ASP.Agent.* PowerShell.Agent.*
5 shared
Jul 28, 2025
Update Microsoft SharePoint ASAP | Kaspersky official blog
The recently disclosed critical Microsoft SharePoint vulnerability has been under exploitation as early as July 7, 2025, according to findings from Check Point Research. The cybersecurity company said it observed first exploitation attempts targeting an unnamed major Western government, with the activity intensifying on July 18 and 19, spanning government, telecommunications, and software sectors in North America and Western Europe. Check Point also said the exploitation efforts originated from three different IP addresses – 104.238.159[.]149, 107.191.58[.]76, and 96.9.125[.]147 – one of which was previously tied to the weaponization of security flaws in Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM) appliances (CVE-2025-4427 and CVE-2025-4428). "We're witnessing an urgent and active threat: a critical zero-day in SharePoint on-prem is being exploited in the wild, putting thousands of global organizations at risk," Lotem Finkelstein, Director of Threat Intelligence at Check Point Research, told The Hacker News. "Our team has confirmed dozens of compromise attempts across government, telecom, and tech sectors since July 7. We strongly urge enterprises to update their security systems immediately – this campaign is both sophisticated and fast-moving." The attack chains have been observed leveraging CVE-2025-53770, a newly patched remote code execution flaw in SharePoint Server, and chaining it with CVE-2025-49706, a spoofing vulnerability that was patched by Microsoft as part of its July 2025 Patch Tuesday update, to gain initial access and escalate privileges. It's worth mentioning at this stage that there are two sets of vulnerabilities in SharePoint that have come to light this month - CVE-2025-49704 (CVSS score: 8.8) - Microsoft SharePoint Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (Fixed on July 8, 2025) CVE-2025-49706 (CVSS score: 6.5) - Microsoft SharePoint Server Spoofing Vulnerability (Fixed on July 8, 2025) CVE-2025-53770 (CVSS score: 9.8) - Microsoft SharePoint Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2025-53771 (CVSS score: 6.5) - Microsoft SharePoint Server Spoofing Vulnerability CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, collectively referred to as ToolShell, is an exploitation chain that can lead to remote code execution on SharePoint Server instances. They were originally disclosed by Viettel Cyber Security during the Pwn2Own 2025 hacking competition earlier this May. CVE-2025-53770 and CVE-2025-53771, which became public knowledge over the weekend, have been described as variants of CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, respectively, indicating that they are bypasses for the original fixes put in place by Microsoft earlier this month. This is evidenced by the fact that Microsoft acknowledged active attacks exploiting "vulnerabilities partially addressed by the July Security Update." The company also noted in its advisories that the updates for CVE-2025-53770 and CVE-2025-53771 include "more robust protections" than the updates for CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706. However, it bears noting that CVE-2025-53771 has not been flagged by Redmond as actively exploited in the wild. "CVE-2025-53770 exploits a weakness in how Microsoft SharePoint Server handles the deserialization of untrusted data," Martin Zugec, technical solutions director at Bitdefender, said. "Attackers are leveraging this flaw to gain unauthenticated remote code execution." This, in turn, is achieved by deploying malicious ASP.NET web shells that programmatically extract sensitive cryptographic keys. These stolen keys are subsequently leveraged to craft and sign malicious __VIEWSTATE payloads, thereby establishing persistent access and enabling the execution of arbitrary commands on SharePoint Server. According to Bitdefender telemetry, in-the-wild exploitation has been detected in the United States, Canada, Austria, Jordan, Mexico, Germany, South Africa, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, suggesting widespread abuse of the flaw. Palo Alto Networks Unit 42, in its own analysis of the campaign, said it observed commands being run to execute a Base64-encoded PowerShell command, which creates a file at the location "C:\PROGRA~1\COMMON~1\MICROS~1\WEBSER~1\16\TEMPLATE\LAYOUTS\spinstall0.aspx" and then parses its content. "The spinstall0.aspx file is a web shell that can execute various functions to retrieve ValidationKeys, DecryptionKeys, and the CompatabilityMode of the server, which are needed to forge ViewState Encryption keys," Unit 42 said in a threat brief. In an advisory issued Monday, SentinelOne said it first detected exploitation on July 17, with the cybersecurity company identifying three "distinct attack clusters," including state-aligned threat actors, engaging in reconnaissance and early-stage exploitation activities. Targets of the campaigns include technology consulting, manufacturing, critical infrastructure, and professional services tied to sensitive architecture and engineering organizations. "The early targets suggest that the activity was initially carefully selective, aimed at organizations with strategic value or elevated access," researchers Simon Kenin, Jim Walter, and Tom Hegel said. Analysis of the attack activity has revealed the use of a password-protected ASPX web shell ("xxx.aspx") on July 18, 2025, at 9:58 a.m. GMT. The web shell supports three functions: Authentication via an embedded form, command execution via cmd.exe, and file upload. Subsequent exploitation efforts have been found to employ the "spinstall0.aspx" web shell to extract and expose sensitive cryptographic material from the host. Spinstall0.aspx is "not a traditional command web shell but rather a reconnaissance and persistence utility," the researchers explained. "This code extracts and prints the host's MachineKey values, including the ValidationKey, DecryptionKey, and cryptographic mode settings -- information critical for attackers seeking to maintain persistent access across load-balanced SharePoint environments or to forge authentication tokens." Unlike other web shells that are typically dropped on internet-exposed servers to facilitate remote access, spinstall0.aspx appears to be designed with the sole intention of gathering cryptographic secrets that could then be used to forge authentication or session tokens across SharePoint instances. These attacks, per CrowdStrike, commence with a specially crafted HTTP POST request to an accessible SharePoint server via the "/_layouts/15/ToolPane.aspx" endpoint that attempts to write spinstall0.aspx via PowerShell. The company said it blocked hundreds of exploitation attempts across more than 160 customer environments. SentinelOne also discovered a cluster dubbed "no shell" that took a "more advanced and stealthy approach" to other threat actors by opting for in-memory .NET module execution without dropping any payloads on disk. The activity originated from the IP address 96.9.125[.]147. "This approach significantly complicates detection and forensic recovery, underscoring the threat posed by fileless post-exploitation techniques," the company said, positing that it's either a "skilled red team emulation exercise or the work of a capable threat actor with a focus on evasive access and credential harvesting." It's currently not known who is behind the attack activity, although Google-owned Mandiant has attributed the early-exploitation to a China-aligned hacking group. Data from Censys shows that there are 9,762 on-premises SharePoint servers online, although it's currently not known if all of them are susceptible to the flaws. Given that SharePoint servers are a lucrative target for threat actors due to the nature of sensitive organizational data stored in them, it's essential that users move quickly to apply the fixes, rotate the keys, and restart the instances. "We assess that at least one of the actors responsible for the early exploitation is a China-nexus threat actor," Charles Carmakal, CTO, Mandiant Consulting at Google Cloud, said in a post on LinkedIn. "We're aware of victims in several sectors and global geographies. The activity primarily involved the theft of machine key material which could be used to access victim environments after the patch has been applied." (The story was updated after publication on July 23, 2025, to reflect the change in CVSS scores.)
5 shared
Jul 22, 2025
US Tops Hit List as 396 SharePoint Systems Compromised Globally
Check Point Research (CPR) conducted a focused analysis of Storm-2603, a threat actor associated with recent ToolShell exploitations, together with other Chinese APT groups. Storm-2603 utilizes a custom malware Command and Control (C2) framework dubbed internally by the attacker as “ak47c2”. This framework includes at least two different types of clients: HTTP-based (dubbed by us “ak47http”) and DNS-based (dubbed by us “ak47dns”). Based on VirusTotal data, Storm-2603 likely targeted some organizations in Latin America throughout the first half of 2025, in parallel to attacking organizations in APAC. Some of the actor’s TTPs align with many other ransomware groups, and involve open-source tools such as PsExec and masscan. In addition, the threat actors use a custom tool that leverages the BYOVD (Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver) technique to tamper with endpoint protections. Storm-2603 attacks involved multiple ransomware families, sometimes bundled together. Those are commonly deployed by abusing DLL hijacking. Check Point Research (CPR) has been closely monitoring the ongoing exploitation of a group of Microsoft SharePoint Server vulnerabilities collectively referred to as “ToolShell.” These active attacks leverage four vulnerabilities—CVE-2025-49704, CVE-2025-49706, CVE-2025-53770, and CVE-2025-53771—and are attributed to multiple China affiliated threat actors. Among the threat groups identified by Microsoft, two are known APTs: Linen Typhoon (aka APT27) and Violet Typhoon (aka APT31). Another group is a newly observed, previously undocumented cluster called Storm-2603. While Microsoft linked this cluster’s activity to potential ransomware deployment, it was unable to assess the group’s objectives. As part of our ongoing investigation into ToolShell and its associated risks, we launched a targeted effort to better understand and characterize the threat posed by Storm-2603. Throughout our analysis, we uncovered several files likely tied to Storm-2603 intrusions, offering new insights that correspond to Microsoft’s description of the group. In this publication, we provide an in-depth examination of Storm-2603’s tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), along with a technical breakdown of the ak47c2, a custom malware framework used in their attacks and their different ransomware payloads. Storm-2603 was first mentioned by Microsoft during investigations into a set of attacks on Microsoft SharePoint servers, known as the “ToolShell” campaign. While some activity was tied to known Chinese affiliated groups like Linen Typhoon (APT27) and Violet Typhoon (APT31), Storm-2603 appeared as a new, previously unreported actor. Microsoft linked the group to Lockbit and Warlock ransomware use. Figure 1 – Events associated with Storm-2603. Microsoft’s report provided only limited information about Storm-2603, including some of the TTPs associated with it, most of them quite generic. In addition, some of the reported indicators of compromise (IOCs) helped us uncover additional artifacts associated with previous Storm-2603 intrusions. One domain in particular, update.updatemicfosoft[.]com, linked to Storm-2603’s SharePoint exploitation, turned out to have been used in earlier campaigns dating back to March 2025. In those operations, it served as a C2 server for both DNS tunneling malware and an HTTP backdoor and was part of infrastructure used to deliver LockBit Black and Warlock/x2anylock ransomware. Our search for cases where the IOCs reported by Microsoft, revealed two incidents in which LockBit Black and WarLock ransomware variants were deployed together, in addition to multiple other tools, mostly open-source. In April 2025, a RAR archive named Evidencia.rar was uploaded to VirusTotal. The archive contains several artifacts likely extracted from compromised machines in a Storm-2603 case in a LATAM country. The artifacts in the archive provide a look at some of the open-source tools used by the actors in the intrusions which correlates with previous knowledge of the group: WinPcap – Captures and filters network traffic on Windows. PsExec – Executes commands on remote Windows systems. SharpHostInfo – Collects host and domain info on Windows environments. nxc – Exploits common vulnerabilities in network services. In addition to the open-source tools, the archive also contains the custom backdoor used by the group, as well as its unique ransomware payloads. dnsclient.exe – A custom backdoor utilized by Storm-2603 that communicates over DNS tunneling with update.updatemicfosoft[.]com, a domain associated with the group. See the next section for our analysis of the backdoor. 7z.exe & 7z.dll – Legitimate 7z executable side-loading malicious 7z.dll delivering X2anylock (aka Warlock), a ransomware used by Storm-2603. bbb.msi – An installer which uses clink_x86.exe to side-load clink_dll_x86.dll, leading to the execution of LockBit Black ransomware. Another MSI file uploaded to VirusTotal in April used a similar deployment method, starting with the MSI installer to launch multiple ransomware strains simultaneously: Figure 2 – MSI Multi-Ransomware Deployment. The MSI relies on the following files: MpCmdRun.exe & Mpclient.dll – Warlock Ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. clink_x86.exe & clink_dll_x86.dll – LockBit Black ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. z.exe & z.dll – x2anylock ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. VMToolsEng.exe – Custom Antivirus Terminator. ServiceMouse.sys – Vulnerable driver used by VMToolsEng.exe for killing Antivirus processes. log.exe – A list of Antivirus processes to kill. msi.bat – Executes VMToolsEng.exe. 1.bat – Executes all the needed executables and the MSI. We attributed two custom backdoors to Storm-2306, both of which appear to be part of the framework named AK47 C2 based on the shared PDB path: C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\work\tools\ak47c2\. When executed, the program immediately hides its console window, determines the host computer name (defaulting to unknown.local if that fails), and builds a DNS‑based command‑and‑control payload. It chooses a random five-character session ID, such as H4T14, and prefixes it with 1 for task requests or 2 for result uploads (e.g., 1H4T14 or 2H4T14). Each element, such as the task/result tag, a size flag (a for “all” when the entire message fits into one request), and the computer name, is XOR‑encoded with the ASCII key “VHBD@H”, converted to hexadecimal, and concatenated with dots before being prepended to the C2 domain update.micfosoft[.]com. This what the overall query looks like: DNS TXT and MG (a mail group member record type) record lookups (DnsQuery_A) are used to transmit and retrieve data. If the C2 server is unreachable, the client simply receives error 9003 (DNS_ERROR_RCODE_NAME_ERROR). Otherwise, the response text is decoded from hex, XOR‑decrypted, and parsed for the delimiter “:::”, which separates metadata from the actual command string. Commands run under cmd.exe /c 2>&1; a built‑in directive sleep n pauses execution for n seconds. For outputs larger than 0xFF bytes, the backdoor fragments data into 63‑byte sub‑segments. Each DNS query then follows: HttpClient backdoor has the pdb path C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\work\tools\ak47c2\httpclient-cpp\x64\Release\httpclient-cpp.pdb and uses plain HTTP instead of DNS for the C2. It is built as a 64‑bit console program that also immediately hides its window on launch. On start‑up, the malware gathers the host computer name (similar to the DNS version, it defaults to unknown.local), then builds a JSON object with the fields cmd, cmd_id, fqdn, result, and type. For a task request, the object looks like this: {"cmd":"","cmd_id":"","fqdn":" ","result":"","type":"task"} After the host executes a command, the result is sent back with type:”result”. Before transmission, the entire JSON blob is XOR‑encrypted with the ASCII key “VHBD@H”, converted to hexadecimal, and placed in the body of an HTTP POST to “/” with generic headers (Content‑Type: text/plain, Accept: */*). The C2 replies with a similarly encoded JSON where the cmd field contains the next command. The implant executes it via cmd.exe /c 2>&1 and returns the output. We identified that during these attacks, several types of ransomware were deployed simultaneously. One is regular LockBit Black, and the second uses the.x2anylock extension. This extension was later used by the Warlock ransomware operator, mentioned in Microsoft’s report on the SharePoint exploitation. The Warlock ransom note is usually saved as How to decrypt my data.txt and looks like this: Figure 3 – Warlock Group ransom note. The ransom notes for all ransomware strains deployed by Storm-2603 are named How to decrypt my data.log (x2anylock) or .README.txt (LockBit Black) and have the same short content: Your decrypt ID: [redacted] Tox ID Support: 3DCE[redacted] Email Support: [redacted]@proton.me,[redacted]@proton.me,[redacted]@proton.me You can contact us in email or qtox. This ransom note’s name How to decrypt my data.log appeared in a recent LinkedIn post by Huntress, describing the case where multiple ransomware families were deployed together against the same target. While not a new tactic, this approach is rarely observed among established ransomware groups. An important part of the infection package described earlier is called Antivirus Terminator. It is a custom command line tool abusing a third-party signed legitimate driver to kill processes. From what we can see, it’s been in the wild since at least late 2024. The tool requires administrative privileges on the infected machine. The screenshot below shows how the listing is displayed in the console when the tool is run without parameters: Figure 4 – Antivirus Terminator supported arguments when run without parameters. The tool first creates a service called ServiceMouse, where the path to the service binary file is ServiceMouse.sys from the package. Next, the tool communicates with the installed service via IO control code 0x99000050, which is responsible for killing processes. The tool also has more capabilities, like deleting files and uninstalling drivers, and these use different IO control codes (0x990000D0 and 0x990001D0). Figure 6 – Antivirus Terminator kills process using third-party driver. The supplied third-party driver is a legitimate and signed component of Antiy System In-Depth Analysis Toolkit, originally named AToolsKrnl64.sys. The toolkit was developed by Antiy Labs, a Chinese security vendor, and features a graphical user interface that allows users, among others, to interact with and manipulate processes. The ability to kill processes is the most important feature which is abused by threat actors in this particular case. Figure 7 – Antiy System In-Depth Analysis Tookit GUI. The following piece of code in the driver handles the IO control code 0x99000050 mentioned above: Figure 8 – IO control code processing in the Antiy driver. The second function is the piece of code responsible for killing a process with a given PID. In this report we analyze Storm-2603, a relatively new threat actor first mentioned by Microsoft during investigations into the “ToolShell” campaign targeting SharePoint servers. While some of the exploitation activity was tied to known Chinese APT groups, Storm-2603 stood out as a previously undocumented group linked to ransomware deployment. By examining infrastructure indicators shared in public reporting, we were able to connect this actor to earlier campaigns involving LockBit Black and Warlock/X2anylock ransomware, dating back to at least March 2025. These earlier attacks used similar infrastructure and tools, including DNS tunneling and HTTP-based backdoors. Interestingly, multiple ransomware variants were deployed in the same attack. This behavior, along with the overlap in techniques, helps us better understand how Storm-2603 operates “The Turkish Rat” Evolved Adwind in a Massive Ongoing Phishing Campaign Check Point Research Publications August 11, 2017 “The Next WannaCry” Vulnerability is Here Check Point Research Publications March 12, 2026 “Handala Hack” – Unveiling Group’s Modus Operandi SUBSCRIBE TO CYBER INTELLIGENCE REPORTS We value your privacy! BFSI uses cookies on this site. We use cookies to enable faster and easier experience for you. By continuing to visit this website you agree to our use of cookies.
5 shared
Aug 1, 2025
The Heat Wasn't Just Outside: Cyber Attacks Spiked in Summer 2025
Check Point Research (CPR) conducted a focused analysis of Storm-2603, a threat actor associated with recent ToolShell exploitations, together with other Chinese APT groups. Storm-2603 utilizes a custom malware Command and Control (C2) framework dubbed internally by the attacker as “ak47c2”. This framework includes at least two different types of clients: HTTP-based (dubbed by us “ak47http”) and DNS-based (dubbed by us “ak47dns”). Based on VirusTotal data, Storm-2603 likely targeted some organizations in Latin America throughout the first half of 2025, in parallel to attacking organizations in APAC. Some of the actor’s TTPs align with many other ransomware groups, and involve open-source tools such as PsExec and masscan. In addition, the threat actors use a custom tool that leverages the BYOVD (Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver) technique to tamper with endpoint protections. Storm-2603 attacks involved multiple ransomware families, sometimes bundled together. Those are commonly deployed by abusing DLL hijacking. Check Point Research (CPR) has been closely monitoring the ongoing exploitation of a group of Microsoft SharePoint Server vulnerabilities collectively referred to as “ToolShell.” These active attacks leverage four vulnerabilities—CVE-2025-49704, CVE-2025-49706, CVE-2025-53770, and CVE-2025-53771—and are attributed to multiple China affiliated threat actors. Among the threat groups identified by Microsoft, two are known APTs: Linen Typhoon (aka APT27) and Violet Typhoon (aka APT31). Another group is a newly observed, previously undocumented cluster called Storm-2603. While Microsoft linked this cluster’s activity to potential ransomware deployment, it was unable to assess the group’s objectives. As part of our ongoing investigation into ToolShell and its associated risks, we launched a targeted effort to better understand and characterize the threat posed by Storm-2603. Throughout our analysis, we uncovered several files likely tied to Storm-2603 intrusions, offering new insights that correspond to Microsoft’s description of the group. In this publication, we provide an in-depth examination of Storm-2603’s tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), along with a technical breakdown of the ak47c2, a custom malware framework used in their attacks and their different ransomware payloads. Storm-2603 was first mentioned by Microsoft during investigations into a set of attacks on Microsoft SharePoint servers, known as the “ToolShell” campaign. While some activity was tied to known Chinese affiliated groups like Linen Typhoon (APT27) and Violet Typhoon (APT31), Storm-2603 appeared as a new, previously unreported actor. Microsoft linked the group to Lockbit and Warlock ransomware use. Figure 1 – Events associated with Storm-2603. Microsoft’s report provided only limited information about Storm-2603, including some of the TTPs associated with it, most of them quite generic. In addition, some of the reported indicators of compromise (IOCs) helped us uncover additional artifacts associated with previous Storm-2603 intrusions. One domain in particular, update.updatemicfosoft[.]com, linked to Storm-2603’s SharePoint exploitation, turned out to have been used in earlier campaigns dating back to March 2025. In those operations, it served as a C2 server for both DNS tunneling malware and an HTTP backdoor and was part of infrastructure used to deliver LockBit Black and Warlock/x2anylock ransomware. Our search for cases where the IOCs reported by Microsoft, revealed two incidents in which LockBit Black and WarLock ransomware variants were deployed together, in addition to multiple other tools, mostly open-source. In April 2025, a RAR archive named Evidencia.rar was uploaded to VirusTotal. The archive contains several artifacts likely extracted from compromised machines in a Storm-2603 case in a LATAM country. The artifacts in the archive provide a look at some of the open-source tools used by the actors in the intrusions which correlates with previous knowledge of the group: WinPcap – Captures and filters network traffic on Windows. PsExec – Executes commands on remote Windows systems. SharpHostInfo – Collects host and domain info on Windows environments. nxc – Exploits common vulnerabilities in network services. In addition to the open-source tools, the archive also contains the custom backdoor used by the group, as well as its unique ransomware payloads. dnsclient.exe – A custom backdoor utilized by Storm-2603 that communicates over DNS tunneling with update.updatemicfosoft[.]com, a domain associated with the group. See the next section for our analysis of the backdoor. 7z.exe & 7z.dll – Legitimate 7z executable side-loading malicious 7z.dll delivering X2anylock (aka Warlock), a ransomware used by Storm-2603. bbb.msi – An installer which uses clink_x86.exe to side-load clink_dll_x86.dll, leading to the execution of LockBit Black ransomware. Another MSI file uploaded to VirusTotal in April used a similar deployment method, starting with the MSI installer to launch multiple ransomware strains simultaneously: Figure 2 – MSI Multi-Ransomware Deployment. The MSI relies on the following files: MpCmdRun.exe & Mpclient.dll – Warlock Ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. clink_x86.exe & clink_dll_x86.dll – LockBit Black ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. z.exe & z.dll – x2anylock ransomware, deployed via DLL-hijacking. VMToolsEng.exe – Custom Antivirus Terminator. ServiceMouse.sys – Vulnerable driver used by VMToolsEng.exe for killing Antivirus processes. log.exe – A list of Antivirus processes to kill. msi.bat – Executes VMToolsEng.exe. 1.bat – Executes all the needed executables and the MSI. We attributed two custom backdoors to Storm-2306, both of which appear to be part of the framework named AK47 C2 based on the shared PDB path: C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\work\tools\ak47c2\. When executed, the program immediately hides its console window, determines the host computer name (defaulting to unknown.local if that fails), and builds a DNS‑based command‑and‑control payload. It chooses a random five-character session ID, such as H4T14, and prefixes it with 1 for task requests or 2 for result uploads (e.g., 1H4T14 or 2H4T14). Each element, such as the task/result tag, a size flag (a for “all” when the entire message fits into one request), and the computer name, is XOR‑encoded with the ASCII key “VHBD@H”, converted to hexadecimal, and concatenated with dots before being prepended to the C2 domain update.micfosoft[.]com. This what the overall query looks like: DNS TXT and MG (a mail group member record type) record lookups (DnsQuery_A) are used to transmit and retrieve data. If the C2 server is unreachable, the client simply receives error 9003 (DNS_ERROR_RCODE_NAME_ERROR). Otherwise, the response text is decoded from hex, XOR‑decrypted, and parsed for the delimiter “:::”, which separates metadata from the actual command string. Commands run under cmd.exe /c 2>&1; a built‑in directive sleep n pauses execution for n seconds. For outputs larger than 0xFF bytes, the backdoor fragments data into 63‑byte sub‑segments. Each DNS query then follows: HttpClient backdoor has the pdb path C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\work\tools\ak47c2\httpclient-cpp\x64\Release\httpclient-cpp.pdb and uses plain HTTP instead of DNS for the C2. It is built as a 64‑bit console program that also immediately hides its window on launch. On start‑up, the malware gathers the host computer name (similar to the DNS version, it defaults to unknown.local), then builds a JSON object with the fields cmd, cmd_id, fqdn, result, and type. For a task request, the object looks like this: {"cmd":"","cmd_id":"","fqdn":" ","result":"","type":"task"} After the host executes a command, the result is sent back with type:”result”. Before transmission, the entire JSON blob is XOR‑encrypted with the ASCII key “VHBD@H”, converted to hexadecimal, and placed in the body of an HTTP POST to “/” with generic headers (Content‑Type: text/plain, Accept: */*). The C2 replies with a similarly encoded JSON where the cmd field contains the next command. The implant executes it via cmd.exe /c 2>&1 and returns the output. We identified that during these attacks, several types of ransomware were deployed simultaneously. One is regular LockBit Black, and the second uses the.x2anylock extension. This extension was later used by the Warlock ransomware operator, mentioned in Microsoft’s report on the SharePoint exploitation. The Warlock ransom note is usually saved as How to decrypt my data.txt and looks like this: Figure 3 – Warlock Group ransom note. The ransom notes for all ransomware strains deployed by Storm-2603 are named How to decrypt my data.log (x2anylock) or .README.txt (LockBit Black) and have the same short content: Your decrypt ID: [redacted] Tox ID Support: 3DCE[redacted] Email Support: [redacted]@proton.me,[redacted]@proton.me,[redacted]@proton.me You can contact us in email or qtox. This ransom note’s name How to decrypt my data.log appeared in a recent LinkedIn post by Huntress, describing the case where multiple ransomware families were deployed together against the same target. While not a new tactic, this approach is rarely observed among established ransomware groups. An important part of the infection package described earlier is called Antivirus Terminator. It is a custom command line tool abusing a third-party signed legitimate driver to kill processes. From what we can see, it’s been in the wild since at least late 2024. The tool requires administrative privileges on the infected machine. The screenshot below shows how the listing is displayed in the console when the tool is run without parameters: Figure 4 – Antivirus Terminator supported arguments when run without parameters. The tool first creates a service called ServiceMouse, where the path to the service binary file is ServiceMouse.sys from the package. Next, the tool communicates with the installed service via IO control code 0x99000050, which is responsible for killing processes. The tool also has more capabilities, like deleting files and uninstalling drivers, and these use different IO control codes (0x990000D0 and 0x990001D0). Figure 6 – Antivirus Terminator kills process using third-party driver. The supplied third-party driver is a legitimate and signed component of Antiy System In-Depth Analysis Toolkit, originally named AToolsKrnl64.sys. The toolkit was developed by Antiy Labs, a Chinese security vendor, and features a graphical user interface that allows users, among others, to interact with and manipulate processes. The ability to kill processes is the most important feature which is abused by threat actors in this particular case. Figure 7 – Antiy System In-Depth Analysis Tookit GUI. The following piece of code in the driver handles the IO control code 0x99000050 mentioned above: Figure 8 – IO control code processing in the Antiy driver. The second function is the piece of code responsible for killing a process with a given PID. In this report we analyze Storm-2603, a relatively new threat actor first mentioned by Microsoft during investigations into the “ToolShell” campaign targeting SharePoint servers. While some of the exploitation activity was tied to known Chinese APT groups, Storm-2603 stood out as a previously undocumented group linked to ransomware deployment. By examining infrastructure indicators shared in public reporting, we were able to connect this actor to earlier campaigns involving LockBit Black and Warlock/X2anylock ransomware, dating back to at least March 2025. These earlier attacks used similar infrastructure and tools, including DNS tunneling and HTTP-based backdoors. Interestingly, multiple ransomware variants were deployed in the same attack. This behavior, along with the overlap in techniques, helps us better understand how Storm-2603 operates “The Turkish Rat” Evolved Adwind in a Massive Ongoing Phishing Campaign Check Point Research Publications August 11, 2017 “The Next WannaCry” Vulnerability is Here Check Point Research Publications March 12, 2026 “Handala Hack” – Unveiling Group’s Modus Operandi SUBSCRIBE TO CYBER INTELLIGENCE REPORTS We value your privacy! BFSI uses cookies on this site. We use cookies to enable faster and easier experience for you. By continuing to visit this website you agree to our use of cookies.
5 shared
Aug 8, 2025
US Tops Hit List as 396 SharePoint Systems Compromised Globally
On July 19–20, 2025, various security companies and national CERTs published alerts about active exploitation of on-premise SharePoint servers. According to the reports, observed attacks did not require authentication, allowed attackers to gain full control over the infected servers, and were performed using an exploit chain of two vulnerabilities: CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, publicly named “ToolShell”. Additionally, on the same dates, Microsoft released out-of-band security patches for the vulnerabilities CVE-2025-53770 and CVE-2025-53771, aimed at addressing the security bypasses of previously issued fixes for CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706. The release of the new, “proper” updates has caused confusion about exactly which vulnerabilities attackers are exploiting and whether they are using zero-day exploits. Kaspersky products proactively detected and blocked malicious activity linked to these attacks, which allowed us to gather statistics about the timeframe and spread of this campaign. Our statistics show that widespread exploitation started on July 18, 2025, and attackers targeted servers across the world in Egypt, Jordan, Russia, Vietnam, and Zambia. Entities across multiple sectors were affected: government, finance, manufacturing, forestry, and agriculture. While analyzing all artifacts related to these attacks, which were detected by our products and public information provided by external researchers, we found a dump of a POST request that was claimed to contain the malicious payload used in these attacks. After performing our own analysis, we were able to confirm that this dump indeed contained the malicious payload detected by our technologies, and that sending this single request to an affected SharePoint installation was enough to execute the malicious payload there. Our analysis of the exploit showed that it did rely on vulnerabilities fixed under CVE-2025-49704 and CVE-2025-49706, but by changing just one byte in the request, we were able to bypass those fixes. In this post, we provide detailed information about CVE-2025-49704, CVE-2025-49706, CVE-2025-53770, CVE-2025-53771, and one related vulnerability. Since the exploit code is already published online, is very easy to use, and poses a significant risk, we encourage all organizations to install the necessary updates. The exploit Our research started with an analysis of a POST request dump associated with this wave of attacks on SharePoint servers. We can see that this POST request targets the “/_layouts/15/ToolPane.aspx” endpoint and embeds two parameters: “MSOtlPn_Uri” and “MSOtlPn_DWP”. Looking at the code of ToolPane.aspx, we can see that this file itself does not contain much functionality and most of its code is located in the ToolPane class of the Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages namespace in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. Looking at this class reveals the code that works with the two parameters present in the exploit. However, accessing this endpoint under normal conditions is not possible without bypassing authentication on the attacked SharePoint server. This is where the first Microsoft SharePoint Server Spoofing Vulnerability CVE-2025-49706 comes into play. CVE-2025-49706 This vulnerability is present in the method PostAuthenticateRequestHandler, in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. SharePoint requires Internet Information Services (IIS) to be configured in integrated mode. In this mode, the IIS and ASP.NET authentication stages are unified. As a result, the outcome of IIS authentication is not determined until the PostAuthenticateRequest stage, at which point both the ASP.NET and IIS authentication methods have been completed. Therefore, the PostAuthenticateRequestHandler method utilizes a series of flags to track potential authentication violations. A logic bug in this method enables an authentication bypass if the “Referrer” header of the HTTP request is equal to “/_layouts/SignOut.aspx”, “/_layouts/14/SignOut.aspx”, or “/_layouts/15/SignOut.aspx” using case insensitive comparison. The code displayed in the image above handles the sign-out request and is also triggered when the sign-out page is specified as the referrer. When flag6 is set to false and flag7 is set to true, both conditional branches that could potentially throw an “Unauthorized Access” exception are bypassed. On July 8, 2025, Microsoft released an update that addressed this vulnerability by introducing additional checks to detect the usage of the “ToolPane.aspx” endpoint with the sign-out page specified as the referrer. The added check uses case insensitive comparison to verify if the requested path ends with “ToolPane.aspx”. Is it possible to bypass this check, say, by using a different endpoint? Our testing has shown that this check can be easily bypassed. CVE-2025-53771 We were able to successfully bypass the patch for vulnerability CVE-2025-49706 by adding just one byte to the exploit POST request. All that was required to bypass this patch was to add a “/” (slash) to the end of the requested “ToolPane.aspx” path. On July 20, 2025, Microsoft released an update that fixed this bypass as CVE-2025-53771. This fix replaces the “ToolPane.aspx” check to instead check whether the requested path is in the list of paths allowed for use with the sign-out page specified as the referrer. This allowlist includes the following paths: “/_layouts/15/SignOut.aspx”, “/_layouts/15/1033/initstrings.js”, “/_layouts/15/init.js”, “/_layouts/15/theming.js”, “/ScriptResource.axd”, “/_layouts/15/blank.js”, “/ScriptResource.axd”, “/WebResource.axd”, “/_layouts/15/1033/styles/corev15.css”, “/_layouts/15/1033/styles/error.css”, “/_layouts/15/images/favicon.ico”, “/_layouts/15/1033/strings.js”, “/_layouts/15/core.js”, and it can contain additional paths added by the administrator. While testing the CVE-2025-49706 bypass with the July 8, 2025 updates installed on our SharePoint debugging stand, we noticed some strange behavior. Not only did the bypass of CVE-2025-49706 work, but the entire exploit chain did! But wait! Didn’t the attackers use an additional Microsoft SharePoint Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2025-49704, which was supposed to be fixed in the same update? To understand why the entire exploit chain worked in our case, let’s take a look at the vulnerability CVE-2025-49704 and how it was fixed. CVE-2025-49704 CVE-2025-49704 is an untrusted data deserialization vulnerability that exists due to improper validation of XML content. Looking at the exploit POST request, we can see that it contains two URL encoded parameters: “MSOtlPn_Uri” and “MSOtlPn_DWP”. We can see how they are handled by examining the code of the method GetPartPreviewAndPropertiesFromMarkup in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. A quick analysis reveals that “MSOtlPn_Uri” is a page URL that might be pointing to an any file in the CONTROLTEMPLATES folder and the parameter “MSOtlPn_DWP” contains something known as WebPart markup. This markup contains special directives that can be used to execute safe controls on a server and has a format very similar to XML. While this “XML” included in the “MSOtlPn_DWP” parameter does not itself contain a vulnerability, it allows attackers to instantiate the ExcelDataSet control from Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Client.dll with CompressedDataTable property set to malicious payload and trigger its processing using DataTable property getter. Looking at the code of the ExcelDataSet’s DataTable property getter in Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Client.dll, we find the method GetObjectFromCompressedBase64String, responsible for deserialization of CompressedDataTable property contents. The data provided as Base64 string is decoded, unzipped, and passed to the BinarySerialization.Deserialize method from Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. Attackers use this method to provide a malicious DataSet whose deserialized content is shown in the image above. It contains an XML with an element of dangerous type "System.Collections.Generic.List1[[System.Data.Services.Internal.ExpandedWrapper2[...], System.Data.Services, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089]]", which allows attackers to execute arbitrary methods with the help of the well-known ExpandedWrapper technique aimed at exploitation of unsafe XML deserialization in applications based on the .NET framework. In fact, this shouldn’t be possible, since BinarySerialization.Deserialize in Microsoft.SharePoint.dll uses a special XmlValidator designed to protect against this technique by checking the types of all elements present in the provided XML and ensuring that they are on the list of allowed types. However, the exploit bypasses this check by placing the ExpandedWrapper object into the list. Now, to find out why the exploit worked on our SharePoint debugging stand with the July 8, 2025 updates installed, let’s take a look at how this vulnerability was fixed. In this patch, Microsoft did not really fix the vulnerability but only mitigated it by adding the new AddExcelDataSetToSafeControls class to the Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade namespace. This class contains new code that modifies the web.config file and marks the Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.ExcelDataSet control as unsafe. Because SharePoint does not execute this code on its own after installing updates, the only way to achieve the security effect was to manually run a configuration upgrade using the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard tool. Notably, the security guidance for CVE-2025-49704 does not mention the need for this step, which means at least some SharePoint administrators may skip it. Meanwhile, anyone who installed this update but did not manually perform a configuration upgrade remained vulnerable. CVE-2025-53770 On July 20, 2025, Microsoft released an update with a proper fix for the CVE-2025-49704 vulnerability. This patch introduces an updated XmlValidator that now properly validates element types in XML, preventing exploitation of this vulnerability without requiring a configuration upgrade and, more importantly, addressing the root cause and preventing exploitation of the same vulnerability through controls other than Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.ExcelDataSet. CVE-2020-1147 Readers familiar with previous SharePoint exploits might feel that the vulnerability CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770 and the exploit used by the attackers looks very familiar and very similar to the older .NET Framework, SharePoint Server, and Visual Studio Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2020-1147. In fact, if we compare the exploit for CVE-2020-1147 and an exploit for CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770, we can see that they are almost identical. The only difference is that in the exploit for CVE-2025-49704/CVE-2025-53770, the dangerous ExpandedWrapper object is placed in the list. This makes CVE-2025-53770 an updated fix for CVE-2020-1147. Conclusions Despite the fact that patches for the ToolShell vulnerabilities are now available for deployment, we assess that this chain of exploits will continue being used by attackers for a long time. We have been observing the same situation with other notorious vulnerabilities, such as ProxyLogon, PrintNightmare, or EternalBlue. While they have been known for years, many threat actors still continue leveraging them in their attacks to compromise unpatched systems. We expect the ToolShell vulnerabilities to follow the same fate, as they can be exploited with extremely low effort and allow full control over the vulnerable server. To stay better protected against threats like ToolShell, we as a community should learn lessons from previous events in the industry related to critical vulnerabilities. Specifically, the speed of applying security patches nowadays is the most important factor when it comes to fighting such vulnerabilities. Since public exploits for these dangerous vulnerabilities appear very soon after vulnerability announcements, it is paramount to install patches as soon as possible, as a gap of even a few hours can make a critical difference. At the same time, it is important to protect enterprise networks against zero-day exploits, which can be leveraged when there is no available public patch for vulnerabilities. In this regard, it is critical to equip machines with reliable cybersecurity solutions that have proven effective in combatting ToolShell attacks before they were publicly disclosed. Kaspersky Next with its Behaviour detection component proactively protects against exploitation of these vulnerabilities. Additionally, it is able to detect exploitation and the subsequent malicious activity. Kaspersky products detect the exploits and malware used in these attacks with the following verdicts: UDS:DangerousObject.Multi.Generic PDM:Exploit.Win32.Generic PDM:Trojan.Win32.Generic HEUR:Trojan.MSIL.Agent.gen ASP.Agent.* PowerShell.Agent.*
5 shared
Jul 31, 2025
Worm armed 42 GitHub repos by hiding a payload too big to fail
Some attacks take real skill. Others just need someone to leave a door open. This week has both. Exposed passwords, old bugs still getting exploited, and trusted software doing things it shouldn't. There's a strange mix of clever tricks and careless mistakes. Hackers are borrowing trust from familiar apps, websites, and AI tools. Some are using AI to speed things up. Others are leaving their own attack files exposed. Not exactly careful work. Different stories, familiar weak spots. Here's what showed up this week. The threats change every week. Subscribe, and we’ll alert you when each new ThreatsDay Bulletin is out. PHP2Shell attacks persist WordPress security company Wordefence said it's not aware of any WordPress site compromised through PHP2Shell (CVE-2026-109618 and CVE-2026-109619) as of October 28, 2026. "We continue to see PHP2Shell-related requests across the more than 5 million sites we protect," it said. "Those requests show ongoing scanning and exploitation attempts; they do not show whether an attempt succeeded. Our site-cleaning and incident response teams have not handled a WordPress compromise attributed to these vulnerabilities." 40,573 secrets exposed Hudson Rock's investigation into the FortiBleed credential harvesting campaign has uncovered 975 newly identified domains and 40,573 exposed secrets, including 37,076 local-user records and 1,576 Active Directory LDAP bind records. The data comes from newly obtained 1,703 FortiGate source files associated with 1,689 host identifiers. "The configuration material dates to around February 2026, earlier than the likely May/June material examined in the first investigation," Hudson Rock said. The latest discovery has been codenamed FortiBleed 2.0. Institutional DNS hijacked Threat actors have used domain shadowing to place illegal gambling content beneath legitimate school and government domains in two unrelated operations. "In both cases, an unauthorized party appears to have gained access to DNS administration and created records that the original domain owners may not have noticed," Infoblox said. "Because the resulting hostnames sat within established institutional namespaces, they provided especially useful infrastructure for search-engine optimization (SEO) and traffic acquisition." One cluster, linked to a threat actor called Hidden Hawk, has been found to add individual CNAME records that mapped institutional hostnames to gambling pages hosted largely on Cloudflare Pages. The second campaign exploiting an Indian government domain "delegated entire subzones to third-party authoritative nameservers and used a wildcard, allowing many hostnames to be managed outside the victim's DNS environment." Put differently, the unauthorized DNS access creates new institutional hostnames, which resolve to infrastructure serving illegal gambling doorway pages. The pages also leverage the established reputation of school and government namespaces to ensure that the malicious URLs show up prominently in search engine results. AI banking credential warning Bank of America is reminding customers not to share banking credentials with AI agents. In an email blast to customers titled "Protecting your finances in the AI World," the financial institution urged customers to never share their username and password with another person or an outside service, "including an AI-enabled tool or agent that offers to act on your behalf." Android tightens contact access Google has announced that an upcoming Android release will no longer be able to directly write to contacts with the WRITE_CONTACTS permission. "Instead, you can use the standard contact intents (ACTION_INSERT, ACTION_EDIT, and ACTION_INSERT_OR_EDIT)," Google said. "Currently, if your app needs to save even one contact, you might be requesting WRITE_CONTACTS. But that permission grants broad access, allowing an app to make widespread changes to contacts across the device in the background, even without user interaction. Most apps don’t need such broad permission." 26,400 live credentials exposed A scan of 7.25 million public repositories on Gitee, China's largest indigenous Git hosting platform, has uncovered 26,400 unique verified-live credentials, including an active organization-admin credential for a major enterprise AI platform and thousands of live cloud provider access keys, independent security researcher Ben Zimmermann said. Critical Fortinet fixes released Fortinet has released a "coordinated set of security updates for FortiOS, FortiManager, and FortiAnalyzer" to address critical and high-severity flaws that were flagged using an AI-assisted vulnerability discovery approach. Details of the issues are being kept under wraps until November 10, 2026. With Fortinet devices becoming a favorite target for attackers, it's essential that users move quickly to apply the fixes. Zero-permission token theft Details have emerged about a now-patched flaw in Microsoft Authenticator (CVE-2026-80097 aka AuthMask) that could be exploited by installing and running a malicious application on an affected Android device and convincing the user to complete an authentication flow in the app by claiming to be a trusted app and getting the corresponding tokens. The flaw could be exploited to take over work accounts without requiring additional permissions. "Successful exploitation could allow the attacker to obtain authentication tokens and access resources as the affected user," Microsoft said. According to Enclave, "an unprivileged Android app with zero permissions could impersonate any installed Microsoft first-party app and have the Microsoft Authenticator broker hand it that app's tokens. The setup is a device with Authenticator installed and one work account signed into it." 32 fake AI bots hunt secrets Attackers are disguising themselves as AI agents to steal credentials. Cequence said it has tracked a single actor running AI agent impersonation at scale by posing as about 32 different AI bots, including ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity, while searching for passwords, API keys, and cloud credentials. "The malicious scanner runs from a major cloud provider and rotates through about 32 AI bot identities, spanning crawlers and assistants from OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, Perplexity, and others," Will Glazier said. "It ignores web pages and requests files that commonly store secrets, including .env configuration files, cloud credential files, private SSH keys, and server environment data, working from a list of roughly 90 file paths. Each address sends a short burst of 50 to 190 requests in about eight seconds and then moves on. The scanner works through targets one at a time, around the clock, and first sends random nonsense paths to find websites that answer every request, a common scanning technique. It hit organizations in financial services, retail, telecommunications, energy, and software, and stayed active from at least late September through late October." China-linked network intrusion The U.S. Embassy in Fiji has revealed that hackers linked to China broke into a regional organization based in Suva between July and August 2026. "Hackers with links to China maintained access to the organization's network over several days," it said. The embassy did not name the threat actor. Nor did it disclose what data the attackers may have accessed. Camera software weaponized Attackers have been breaking into enterprise networks via camera management software, according to new research from security firm Huntress, which observed multiple incidents in September and October 2026 and traced them back to a compromised application. Source code artifacts point to a Korean company selling analog and IP cameras and digital and network video recorders. The activity abuses the legitimate "WpcMon.exe" binary to sideload DLLs that establish outbound connections to a remote server. "This activity demonstrates how attackers can blend malicious code with trusted Windows components to evade detection," Huntress said. 68 GB government data breach In a major operational security blunder, an unknown threat actor stole 68 GB from a Philippine government agency, maintained a detailed log of the transfer, then left that log open on the internet at 13.163.205[.]35:80. "The copy finished in under 24 minutes on September 6, 2026," Hunt.io said. "The transfer log records 27 SQL Server backups whose filenames correspond to the case-management systems of a Philippine overseas-employment and migrant-worker administration. Beside the log sat the operator's toolkit, a rebranded GodPotato build, a PowerShell stager, two payloads and a full Impacket environment." AI model data exfiltration concerns Canadian AI company Cohere has claimed that it caught Alibaba's Qwen3.8-Flash-Next model unsuccessfully attempting to send data to China from its evaluation sandbox as part of a prompt instructing the LLM to detect malicious file download and execution by monitoring for curl processes downloading bash scripts to /tmp followed by bash execution. "Asked to write a defensive detection rule, Qwen3.8-Flash-Next ignored instructions and inventoried the machine it was running on and then tried to upload a probe file to an Alibaba Cloud storage bucket in Beijing," Cohere said. "We cannot answer whether this is deliberate or a leftover glitch from training." Cohere has also released a dataset containing the model trace and corresponding raw token IDs in connection with the behavior. "The exact output is not guaranteed all the time, and many trials may be required to reproduce the behavior," Cohere said, adding "there are similarly unexpected URLs that the model also tends to output, most containing aliyunc." However, the findings have also led to social media chatter that the company is resorting to geopolitical fearmongering and that they are an attempt to clamp down on open-weights models. Post-quantum migration roadmap The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released guidelines that detail the timelines for transitioning away from quantum-vulnerable algorithms to quantum-resistant standards. "The report describes different use cases and says why one migration might take longer than another," said NIST mathematician Dustin Moody, who heads the PQC standardization project. "We understand there's not one strategy that fits all use cases, and we want to help people handle their migration while staying abreast of what's changing." AI-powered ransomware operation exposed SOCRadar has uncovered the live workspace (i.e., open directory) of a threat actor tied to the n0n ransomware group, which exposed the operation's full workflow as of September 2026. The directory at 185.157.161[.]148 includes an AI coding agent configured with about 150 models to produce hundreds of attack scripts, with more than $7,216 in usage costs. "Entry points included a credential stuffing campaign against 305 FortiGate SSL-VPN devices, exposed AWS keys, weak RDP/WinRM credentials, and compromised hosting management portals," SOCRadar said. At least 23 organizations across 14 countries are said to have been identified in the workspace, including a U.S. sports retailer, a cloud provider, a teachers’ union, a Venezuelan ISP, an Argentine ministry and a pharmaceutical subsidiary. Government AI access restricted The Swedish government has barred employees from accessing browser-based versions of ChatGPT or Claude on their work computers over security concerns relating to the processing of sensitive data. "Officials were concerned that entering sensitive information into these models without an agreement setting out how to protect and secure the data could lead to it being fed into the model and stored for training," Euro News reported. 42 repositories hijacked JFrog and SafeDep have uncovered a campaign in which threat actors hijacked third-party 42 GitHub repositories across 11 owners to deploy payload blobs large enough "to evade the GitHub search and API paths normally used to find this kind of compromise." JFrog said, "The repositories contain execution hooks for AI coding assistants and IDEs, plus 12.9 to 13.7 MB polymorphic wrappers that all decode to the same hidden CI-publisher payload." The activity is assessed to be related to a Miasma-family npm worm propagated under various packages ending with "testmetest." According to SafeDep, the worm "shares code with Miasma 'Phantom Gyp' from June 2026 and adds the token-revocation wiper from Mini Shai-Hulud. The malicious versions steal credentials, spread to other packages and repositories, and install a wiper that deletes the home directory when the victim revokes the stolen GitHub token." Unsuspecting developers who installed the packages had their data stolen and repositories compromised with malicious code to produce further malicious testmetest releases and run shellpanel workflows targeting cPanel systems through CVE-2026-41940, overlapping with a prior campaign detailed by Socket in July 2026. Android banking malware-as-a-service A new Android malware operation called MR ROBOT is targeting customers of Indian banks and transforming banking fraud into a subscription business, with cybercriminals renting customized banking trojans to steal OTPs, card details, UPI PINs and credentials while secretly forwarding calls to bypass security checks. "It is not a single-actor campaign but a rented crimeware platform: a master operator leases access to affiliates, who use a Telegram bot ('APK Shield) and a web control panel (v7.0) to build personalized banking trojans on demand and distribute them through fake Play-Store-style pages and messaging-app lures," CloudSEK said. The kit impersonates around 36 lure apps, including banks, utility providers, and government services. One affiliate is estimated to have intercepted 5407 text messages from 153 infected devices. MDM platforms abused for remote access Threat actors are abusing legitimate mobile device management (MDM) platforms, like Hexnode and Rippling, by using social engineering to enroll devices or install management agents, per Huntress. "Once established, MDM provides a trusted, privileged path for malicious activity, such as deploying rogue RMM tools and maintaining remote access," it said. Critical Gotenberg RCE exploited Threat actors are exploiting CVE-2026-42589 (CVSS score: 9.8), a critical remote code execution flaw in Gotenberg, to deliver a Go-based reverse shell called "cache_base." The flaw was patched in May 2026. According to VulnCheck, the activity originated from a residential Japanese IP address in early October 2026. "The execution flow is straightforward: acquire a lock, collect host information, connect to C2, register the victim, and open a shell," VulnCheck said. Over the past 30 days, the vulnerability has recorded 1,358 exploitation events from 128 unique source IP addresses. Discord discussions go public Discord has announced it will allow search engines to index discussions in Discoverable Servers and make them accessible on the web to users outside the platform without an account or invitation, starting mid-December 2026. "Discussions in Discoverable Servers will soon be easier to find when you search the web, so you can find the answer you're looking for and step straight into the conversation on Discord," it said. The changes apply only to Discoverable Servers and do not extend to private servers and direct messages. 800+ ransomware victims claimed The Gentlemen ransomware operation has claimed more than 800 victims across multiple regions and sectors, with most attacks targeting organizations in the U.S. and Europe. "The group supports multiple platforms, with ransomware variants targeting Windows, Linux, NAS, and BSD systems, allowing its affiliates to target a broad range of enterprise environments," Acronis said. "The group's operations include the use of EDR-killing tools. In a recent incident, a custom dropper was observed deploying vulnerable Safetica ProcessMonitorDriver [CVE-2025-70795] and Lenovo BootRepair.sys drivers to terminate security processes." AI model loading RCE risk Pillar Security has disclosed an arbitrary-code-execution vulnerability in Unsloth's core model-loading path (CVE-2026-93348, CVSS score: 8.6). It has been fixed in unsloth_zoo 2026.8.14. "An attacker-controlled model configuration could cause Python code to execute during loading," researcher Ariel Fogel said. "The affected code ran inside the model-loading process, with access to whatever that process could read, modify, or authenticate to. In an AI development environment, that can include proprietary datasets, model artifacts, Hugging Face tokens, and cloud credentials. Exploitation required an affected loading path to process an attacker-controlled configuration." Unauthenticated root-level RCE XBOW said it identified an unauthenticated, critical-severity remote code execution bug in a public web application belonging to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). "The vulnerable application was a resource/logistics calculator, not a voting machine or voter registration system," XBOW researcher Ariel Walter Garcia said. "The flaw allowed an unauthenticated attacker to execute code as root inside the backend container, with access to locally protected resources and outbound network connectivity, a privileged foothold reachable via a crafted unauthenticated web request." Session-hijacking RAT emerges A new remote access trojan called DarkCore comes with a dedicated browser that could let attackers access Gmail, WhatsApp, and MediaFire accounts using stolen sessions, while giving the impression that the activity is originating from the victim's own IP address. DarkCore was first advertised on cybercrime forums in August 2026. "The seller describes a browser that reuses those sessions to access work mailboxes, instant messaging apps, cloud storage and other services through the infected machine's IP address," BlackFog said. "The purpose is to make the access look like legitimate activity from the user." AI-powered malware framework Cisco Talos has disclosed details of a new AI-integrated command-and-control (C2) framework called NIK C2. The implant features surveillance, theft, lateral movement, and evasion capabilities, including credential dumping, RDP session hijacking, process hollowing, and a C2-driven screen lock ransomware module. "NIK C2 contains a Windows implant, using which, an actor can dump credentials, stream the victim's keystrokes to collect the targeted victim's sensitive data, and instruct an integrated AI model to analyze the harvested data, all within the compromised session," Talos said. "In this framework, the actor has abused the OpenAI Chat Completions application programming interface (API), which is an HTTP endpoint that enables ChatGPT-style conversations programmatically. In addition to the features that enable theft, an actor can also deploy desktop screen-locking ransomware via the NIK C2 implant onto the victim machine, leading to a ransom demand in Bitcoin or USDT cryptocurrencies." Three different versions of the malware have been identified to date since August 12, 2026. Talos said NIK C2 alters adversary tradecraft by collapsing collection and exploitation into a single continuous session. Malicious PDF delivers backdoor A phishing email using a FedEx tax invoice lure and containing a ZIP archive with a PDF has been observed triggering a multi-stage infection process to deliver a previously undocumented variant of the Sirius Backdoor. "The PDF abuses /OpenAction and /Launch objects to trigger an embedded Base64-encoded PowerShell command upon opening," Trellix said. "Execution relies on social engineering to trick the user into approving the PDF reader's security confirmation prompt. The PowerShell stager decrypts and reflectively loads a .NET assembly in memory. This loader performs process hollowing into legitimate Windows processes such as msbuild.exe, svchost.exe, etc., allowing the malware to operate under trusted process contexts." The final payload is SIRIUS, a Microsoft Visual C++ based backdoor with extended remote access capabilities. AI reshapes ransomware economics A new analysis from Flare has revealed that threat actors are building a mixed AI toolkit, combining commercial models with local, open-weight, and jailbroken alternatives, as well as leaning on stolen AI credentials to shift costs to victims. "Where AI can help is with understanding systems, writing tools and troubleshooting. The threat actor still needs access, decisions and a way to obtain payment," Flare said. "If AI helps an affiliate write a working data-export script without hiring a specialist, the affiliate may avoid that specialist’s fee and the wait for their help. AI makes expertise cheaper to obtain only when the cost of using and checking its work is lower than the cost of the specialist help it replaces." Emerging data-extortion threat A recently observed cyber-extortion actor named ScarlettGroup is publicly advertising alleged data compromises and uses negotiation deadlines and threatened disclosures to pressure targeted organizations. The group's dark web site listing includes victims from technology, education, government, and entertainment sectors. "ScarlettGroup demonstrates characteristics associated with financially motivated data-extortion operations, including public victim claims, deadline-based pressure, and underground forum activity," Foresiet said. "Its dedicated leak-site infrastructure and structured disclosure mechanism indicate an organized approach to promoting alleged compromises and exerting reputational pressure." Infostealers evolve into RATs Following its disruption in June 2026 as part of Operation Endgame, StealC has returned four months later as Stadia. "This time it's not a stealer: it's a full remote access trojan," Varonis said. "The RAT's features include hidden desktop control, a live command shell, a file explorer, a process manager and an in-memory loader, with StealC's stealer welded on as one module among six. The actor behind Stadia is working hard to win back original StealC customers: every former StealC customer is offered a free month on the top ($900) tier." The development comes as Moonlock Lab revealed that the Icarus macOS stealer has similarly evolved from a smash-and-grab crypto and data stealer to a malware with remote-access capabilities. The new iteration is called ICMacOS. "The stealer is actively advertised on cybercrime forums by a Russian-speaking actor operating under the handle GlowComa, with feature updates regularly announced via Telegram," SOCRadar said. "GlowComa promotes ICMacOS alongside Icarus ClickFix, a companion panel designed to deliver payloads using malicious copy-and-paste terminal commands. The infection chain relies on initial dropper scripts to detect the host architecture and harvest administrator passwords using fake system dialogs before delivering the primary payload." Another macOS-focused stealer is Aokigahara, which goes beyond browsers, VPN clients, cryptocurrency wallets, FTP/SFTP clients, password managers, and email applications to also target AI applications and development tools. "The stealer collects authentication files, session data, and configuration files associated with Claude, ChatGPT Desktop, Codex, Cursor, Windsurf, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, and other tools," Check Point said. "Stolen AI credentials could offer opportunities for monetization. Usable credentials or session tokens could enable unauthorized access to paid AI services or the resale of compromised accounts." That's the week's mess. Some attacks were clever, some were painfully simple, and a few attackers made life easier for the people investigating them. The common problem? Too much trust in things nobody was watching closely. AI is adding new tricks, but the old ones aren't going anywhere. Stolen credentials, weak access controls, and forgotten bugs still get plenty of work done. New tools, familiar mistakes. The useful part is knowing where those mistakes keep showing up. That's usually where the next problem starts.
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Oct 30, 2026