APT review: what the world’s threat actors got up to in 2019

[harlan4096]

What were the most interesting developments in terms of APT activity during the year and what can we learn from them?

This is not an easy question to answer, because researchers have only partial visibility and it´s impossible to fully understand the motivation for some attacks or the developments behind them. However, let´s try to approach the problem from different angles in order to get a better understanding of what happened with the benefit of hindsight and perspective.

Compromising supply chains

Targeting supply chains has proved very successful for attackers in recent years – high-profile examples include ShadowPad, ExPetr and the backdooring of CCleaner. In our threat predictions for 2019, we flagged this as a likely continuing attack vector. We didn’t have to wait very long to see this prediction come true.

In January, we discovered a sophisticated supply-chain attack involving a popular consumer hardware vendor, the mechanism used to deliver BIOS, UEFI and software updates to vendor’s laptops and desktops. The attackers behind Operation ShadowHammer added a backdoor to the utility and then distributed it to users through official channels. The goal of the attack was to target with precision an unknown pool of users, identified by their network adapter MAC addresses. The attackers hardcoded a list of MAC addresses into the Trojanized samples, representing the true targets of this massive operation. We were able to extract over 600 unique MAC addresses from more than 200 samples discovered in this attack, although it’s possible that other samples exist that target different MAC addresses. You can read our reports on ShadowHammer here and here.

Disinformation

Q3 was interesting for APT developments in the Middle East, especially considering the multiple leaks of alleged Iranian activity that were published within just a few weeks of each other. Even more interesting is the possibility that one of the leaks may have been part of a disinformation campaign carried out with the help of the Sofacy/Hades actor.

In March, someone going by the handle Dookhtegan or Lab_dookhtegan started posting messages on Twitter using the hashtag #apt34. They shared several files via Telegram that supposedly belonged to the OilRig threat actor. These included logins and passwords of several alleged hacking victims, tools, details of infrastructure potentially related to different intrusions, the résumés of the alleged attackers and a list of web shells – apparently relating to the period 2014-18. The targeting and TTPs are consistent with the OilRig threat actor, but it was impossible to confirm the origins of the tools included in the dump. If the data in the dump is accurate, it would also show the global reach of the OilRig group, which most researchers had thought operates primarily in the Middle East.

On April 22, an entity going by the alias Bl4ck_B0X created a Telegram channel named GreenLeakers. The purpose of the channel, as stated by its creator, was to publish information about the members of the MuddyWater APT group, “along with information about their mother and spouse and etc.” for free. In addition to this free information, the Bl4ck_B0X actor(s) also hinted that they would put up for sale “highly confidential” information related to MuddyWater. On April 27, three screenshots were posted in the GreenLeakers Telegram channel containing alleged screenshots from a MuddyWater C2 server. On May 1, the channel was closed to the public and its status was changed to private. This was before Bl4ck_B0X had the chance to publish the promised information on the MuddyWater group. The reason for the closure is still unclear.

Finally, a website named Hidden Reality published leaks allegedly related to an entity named the Iranian RANA institute. It was the third leak in two months disclosing details of alleged Iranian threat actors and groups. Interestingly, this leak differed from the others by employing a website that allowed anyone to browse the leaked documents. It also relied on Telegram and Twitter profiles to post messages related to Iranian CNO capabilities. The Hidden Reality website contains internal documents, chat messages and other data related to the RANA institute’s CNO (computer network operations) capabilities, as well as information about victims. Previous leaks had focused more on tools, source code and individual actor profiles.

Close analysis of the materials, the infrastructure and the dedicated website used by the leakers provided clues that lead us to believe that Sofacy/Hades may be connected to these leaks.

Lost in Translation and Dark Universe

The well-known Shadow Brokers leak, Lost in Translation, included an interesting Python script – sigs.py – that contained lots of functions to check if a system had already been compromised by another threat actor. Each check is implemented as a function that looks for a unique signature in the system – for example, a file with a unique name or registry path. Although some checks are empty, sigs.py lists 44 entries, many of them related to unknown APTs that have not yet been publicly described.

In 2019, we identified the APT described as the 27th function of the sigs.py file, which we call DarkUniverse. We assess with medium confidence that DarkUniverse is connected with the ItaDuke set of activities due to unique code overlaps.

The main component is a rather simple DLL with only one exported function that implements persistence, malware integrity, communication with the C2 and control over other modules. We found about 20 victims in Western Asia and Northeastern Africa, including medical institutions, atomic energy bodies, military organizations and telecommunications companies.

Mobile attacks

Mobile implants are now a standard part of the toolset of many APT groups; and we have seen ample evidence of this during 2019.

In May, the FT reported that hackers had exploited a zero-day vulnerability in WhatsApp, enabling them to eavesdrop on users, read their encrypted chats, turn on the microphone and camera and install spyware that allows even further surveillance. To exploit the vulnerability, the attacker simply needed to call the victim via WhatsApp. This specially crafted call triggered a buffer overflow in WhatsApp, allowing the attacker to take control of the application and execute arbitrary code in it. The hackers apparently used this, not only to snoop on people’s chats and calls, but also to exploit previously unknown vulnerabilities in the operating system, which allowed them to install applications on the device. WhatsApp quickly released a patch for the exploit – and that seemed to be that. However, in October, the company filed a lawsuit accusing Israel-based NSO Group of having created the exploit. WhatsApp claims that the technology sold by NSO was used to target the mobile phones of more than 1,400 of its customers in 20 different countries, including human rights activists, journalists and others. NSO denies the allegations.

In July, we published a private report about the latest versions of FinSpy for Android and iOS, developed in mid-2018. The developers of FinSpy sell the software to government and law enforcement organizations all over the world, who use it to collect a variety of private user information on various platforms. The mobile implants are similar for iOS and Android. They are capable of collecting personal information such as contacts, messages, emails, calendars, GPS location, photos, files in memory, phone call recordings and data from the most popular messengers. The Android implant includes functionality to gain root privileges on an unrooted device by abusing known vulnerabilities. It seems that the iOS solution does not provide infection exploits for its customers, but is fine-tuned to clean traces of publicly available jailbreaking tools: this suggests that physical access to the victim’s device is required in cases where devices are not already jailbroken. The latest version includes multiple features that we have not observed before. During our recent research, we detected up-to-date versions of these implants in the wild in almost 20 countries, but the size of the customer base would suggest that the real number of victims could be much higher.

In August, Google’s Project Zero team published an extensive analysis of at least 14 iOS zero-days found in the wild and used in five exploitation chains to escalate privileges by an unknown threat actor. According to Google, the attackers used a number of ‘water-holed’ websites to deliver the exploits – possibly from as long as three years ago. While the blog contained no details about the compromised sites, or whether they were still active, Google claimed the websites had received “thousands of visitors per week”. The lack of victim discrimination points to a relatively non-targeted attack. However, the not-so-high estimate of the number of visitors to the water-holed sites, and the capabilities needed to deliver and install this malware, and keep the exploitation chains up-to-date for more than two years, shows a high level of resources and dedication.

In September, Zerodium, a zero-day brokerage firm, indicated that a zero-day for Android was now worth more than one for iOS – the company is now willing to pay $2.5 million for a zero-click Android zero-day with persistence. This is a significant increase on the company’s previous payout ceiling of $2 million for remote iOS jailbreaks. By contrast, Zerodium has also reduced payouts for Apple one-click exploits. On the same day, someone found a high-severity zero-day in the v412 (Video4Linux) driver, the Android media driver. This vulnerability, which could enable privilege escalation, was not included in Google’s September security update. A few days later, an Android flaw was identified that left more than a billion Samsung, Huawei, LG and Sony smartphones vulnerable to an attack that would allow an attacker to gain full access to emails on a compromised device using an SMS message. Whatever the relative value of Android and iOS exploits, it’s clear that mobile exploits are a valuable commodity.
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