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Week in review: Linux rootkit deployed on F5 BIG-IP APM devices, Cisco FMC bugs exploited
Weekly roundup: Cisco FMC and N-able N-central zero-days exploited in the wild, MikroTik RouterOS hijacks, Microsoft Patch Tuesday ships two exploited zero-days.
State-sponsored and financially-motivated attackers are actively exploiting CVE-2026-20079, a critical authentication bypass in Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center (FMC), alongside CVE-2026-20316. N-able issued an emergency hotfix for CVE-2026-86218, a critical pre-auth RCE in the N-central RMM platform exploited in the wild. CERT Polska disclosed six RouterOS vulnerabilities being chained to hijack internet-exposed MikroTik devices. Microsoft's September 2026 Patch Tuesday shipped a record patch count including two zero-days, while roughly 67,000 Trezor customers faced phishing after a shipping-partner breach and researchers privately disclosed a zero-click WeChat worm to Tencent.
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Attackers Exploit Critical Cisco FMC Flaw to deploy Qilin ransomware
Three threat groups, including Qilin ransomware operators, exploit critical Cisco FMC flaws CVE-2026-20079 and CVE-2026-20316 for root access, credential theft, and ransomware.
Cisco Talos identified three post-compromise clusters exploiting recently patched Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center flaws. UAT-12197 deploys JSP web shells and harvests credentials; UAT-11823 (with Sandworm-overlapping tooling) installs Cyclops Blink for persistence; UAT-11988 (Qilin) uses static credentials, extensive reconnaissance, SOCKS5 proxies, reverse-SSH tunnels, AV killers, and ransomware deployment. CISA added CVE-2026-20079 to the KEV catalog with a September 12, 2026 patch deadline for federal agencies; Cisco urges immediate hotfix application.
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Hackers Actively Exploiting FortiGate Firewalls to Deploy Custom Node.js Malware
Attackers actively exploit CVE-2025-25249 in FortiGate firewalls to deploy PivotC2, a Node.js RAT that decrypts VPN and admin credentials.
SOCRadar assesses with high confidence that threat actors are actively exploiting CVE-2025-25249, a CVSS 9.8 heap buffer overflow in the cw_acd daemon (CAPWAP, UDP 5246) affecting FortiOS 6.4-7.6.3 and FortiSwitchManager 7.0.x/7.2.x. Attackers deploy fortirun.bin and PivotC2, a Node.js post-exploitation framework that harvests configurations and decrypts SSL-VPN, wireless, and admin credentials using AES-256-CBC and AES-128-GCM. Over 30,000 FortiGate IPs were scanned and 178 devices compromised, including two confirmed full intrusions of US organizations with Exchange mailbox exfiltration to Wasabi storage. STRU attributes the campaign to a Russian-speaking, financially motivated cybercrime operator.
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PaperCut Flaws Exploited in Attacks on U.S. and European Schools
Attackers are chaining recently disclosed PaperCut flaws CVE-2026-81578 and CVE-2026-82078 to steal credentials and create privileged accounts at US and European schools.
Arctic Wolf researchers observed threat actors exploiting PaperCut servers via CVE-2026-81578 and CVE-2026-82078, chaining an authentication bypass with remote code execution. Post-exploitation included creating a privileged account named Administrator17, downloading credential-harvesting tools with certutil, Meterpreter Java payloads, and registry hive collection to recover the Windows BootKey and reach the SAM database. PaperCut disclosed active exploitation on August 27, 2026, and CISA added both flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog on August 31. PaperCut has a history of exploitation, including attacks that delivered LockBit ransomware.
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StyleSmuggler: Magento and Adobe Commerce 0-day RCE (CVE-2026-75650) under active attack
Sansec details actively exploited StyleSmuggler 0-day (CVE-2026-75650, CVSS 10.0) unauthenticated RCE in Magento and Adobe Commerce, patched by Adobe hotfix APSB26-146.
Sansec is investigating StyleSmuggler, an actively exploited unauthenticated remote code execution chain in Magento Open Source and Adobe Commerce, now tracked as CVE-2026-75650 with CVSS 10.0. Adobe released hotfix VULN-39341 via APSB26-146 (priority 1) on September 7 for versions 2.4.4 through 2.4.9, but stores were being exploited for roughly three days before the fix existed. The implant is a Rust backdoor that disguises itself as kworker, fc-cache, or chronyd processes and exfiltrates host data in MessagePack records sent as fake NTP replies over UDP port 123. Adobe advises rotating the encryption key and every credential it protected, and Sansec stresses patching does not clean already-compromised stores.
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Langflow Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Exploited in Attacks (CVE-2026-0768)
Critical CVSS 9.8 RCE CVE-2026-0768 in Langflow is under active exploitation, with attackers probing for credentials and secrets.
CVE-2026-0768, a critical (CVSS 9.8) remote code execution flaw in Langflow's code validator, lets attackers execute Python code with root privileges via the validate endpoint's code parameter. VulnCheck honeypots in the UK detected Russian-origin exploitation performing reconnaissance and credential harvesting, querying environment variables like LANGFLOW_SUPERUSER and AWS keys and reading Langflow's secret key. Versions before 1.4.2 are affected; no vendor advisory or public PoC was available at reporting time.
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SonicWall Patches Two New Actively Exploited Zero
SonicWall patches two actively exploited SMA 1000 VPN zero-days: CVSS 10.0 pre-auth SSRF CVE-2026-83548 and post-auth command injection CVE-2026-83549, chained for RCE.
SonicWall released hotfixes for two zero-day vulnerabilities in its SMA 1000 VPN appliances, with SonicWall PSIRT confirming active exploitation in the wild. CVE-2026-83548 (CVSS 10.0) is a pre-authentication SSRF in the Appliance Work Place interface allowing unauthenticated unauthorized operations; CVE-2026-83549 (CVSS 7.8) is a post-authentication OS command injection in the Appliance Management Console enabling arbitrary command execution and RCE. The flaws affect models 6210, 7210 and 8200v running 12.4.3-03453 or earlier and 12.5.0-02835 or earlier, fixed in versions 12.4.3-03526 and 12.5.0-02952. This follows a July Volexity report on threat actor UTA0533 chaining two SMA 1000 zero-days to gain root access and deploy the KNUCKLEBALL Python backdoor.
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Threat Brief: Atlassian Confluence Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2022
Unauthenticated Confluence RCE CVE-2022-26134 was exploited in the wild; Volexity observed intrusions and Cerber ransomware on unpatched servers.
Volexity identified exploitation of CVE-2022-26134, an unauthenticated remote code execution vulnerability in Atlassian Confluence Server and Data Center, during Memorial Day weekend 2022, with Atlassian issuing a patch. Cortex Xpanse found 19,707 potentially affected Confluence instances, concentrated in the US, Germany, China, and Russia, plus 1,251 end-of-life versions exposed. Unit 42 and Cortex Managed Threat Hunting observed successful exploitation leading to reconnaissance commands and a Cerber ransomware deployment that was blocked by Cortex XDR. A public PoC has increased exploitation risk.
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Threat Brief: OWASSRF Vulnerability Exploitation
Unit 42 details active exploitation of Exchange SSRF flaws CVE-2022-41080/CVE-2022-41082 via the OWASSRF method, deploying the SilverArrow PowerShell backdoor.
Unit 42 documents OWASSRF, an exploit chain combining CVE-2022-41080 and CVE-2022-41082 to achieve remote code execution on Microsoft Exchange via Outlook Web Access, bypassing Microsoft's ProxyNotShell mitigations. Active exploitation was observed in late November and early December 2022, affecting at least eight organizations. Attackers authenticated to Exchange, then executed a PowerShell backdoor tracked as SilverArrow to create admin accounts, install AnyDesk, tunnel RDP via PuTTY Link, and dump LSASS memory for credential theft. Exploitation is isolated rather than mass-scale because authentication is required.
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Attackers Exploit SharePoint Authentication Bypass After Public PoC Release
Attackers exploit SharePoint authentication bypass CVE-2026-55040 (CVSS 9.1) after Rapid7's PoC release, with 12 exploitation attempts recorded since July 19, 2026.
Microsoft patched CVE-2026-55040 in its July 2026 Patch Tuesday; the 9.1-severity flaw chains four weaknesses in SharePoint's JWT token validation pipeline, letting unauthenticated attackers forge valid JWTs and impersonate any SharePoint site user or administrator. Threat actors began exploiting the bug after Rapid7 released a Python PoC that forges tokens and enumerates domain users by SID. KEVIntel telemetry shows 12 exploitation attempts since July 19, 2026, eight of them on August 12-13 following the PoC release, originating from eight IPs across Hong Kong, Japan, the Netherlands, Taiwan, and the U.S. This is the fifth SharePoint vulnerability exploited this year, alongside CVE-2026-45659, CVE-2026-56164, CVE-2026-58644, and CVE-2026-50522.
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SharePoint CVE-2026-55040 Comes Under Attack Following Public Exploit
Attackers are actively exploiting critical SharePoint authentication bypass CVE-2026-55040 (CVSS 9.1) days after Rapid7 released a public PoC.
CVE-2026-55040 is a critical authentication bypass (CVSS 9.1) in SharePoint Server Subscription Edition that lets unauthenticated attackers forge JWT tokens and impersonate any user, including administrators. Microsoft patched it in July 2026 Patch Tuesday, but Rapid7 published a technical write-up and Python PoC on GitHub on August 12, and Defused quickly observed attackers running the PoC against SharePoint honeypots. KEVIntel recorded 12 exploitation attempts since July 19, with eight occurring on August 12-13 from IP addresses in Hong Kong, Japan, the Netherlands, Taiwan and the U.S. Admin-level SharePoint access exposes documents and data modification and can serve as a foothold into broader Microsoft 365 infrastructure; unpatched instances should apply the July update immediately.
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Researchers Build Self-Replicating AI Worm That Operates Entirely on Local, Open
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