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14 stories in the last 30d

ThreatsDay: 296K IoT Botnet, 100+ Water Systems Targeted, SharePoint RCE Chain + 27 New Stories

Weekly ThreatsDay bulletin details a ShinyHunters-style social engineering hit on ReliaQuest, the 296,000-device Dysphoria IoT botnet, and several new malware families.

ReliaQuest confirmed a social engineering attack on August 22, 2026, in which an attacker used a fake SSO page and MFA push approval to gain brief view-only access to an identity dashboard, with tactics matching ShinyHunters, which has since listed the firm on its leak portal. The Shadowserver Foundation reported the Dysphoria botnet has compromised nearly 296,000 IoT devices for DDoS attacks and recently added residential proxy capability. Cisco Talos documented JWR, an operator-driven phishing-as-a-service framework linked to The Outsider that harvests credentials, identity documents, and 2FA codes over an encrypted WebSocket. New malware coverage includes the Octagon Android fraud bot ($1,400/month), the C2Looper Rust backdoor delivered via ClickFix, and the Aeternum loader that moved C2 to the Polygon blockchain.

The Hacker News · 15d agoMalware in the wild

Gigabud Creates Android Work Profiles to Hide From Banking App Malware Checks

Group-IB reports the Gigabud Android banking trojan uses a cloned work profile to hide from banking app malware checks, with infections confirmed in Indonesia.

Group-IB says Gigabud installs a helper app called Vwork, derived from the open-source Shelter tool, which creates an Android work profile and drops a tampered banking app inside it, hiding the trojan from banking apps' malware scans. Gigabud, active since 2022 and linked by Group-IB to the GoldFactory group, abuses Accessibility access and overlay screens to steal credentials and run fraudulent payments while a black screen conceals the operator's actions. Group-IB confirmed the full attack chain on infected devices in Indonesia, counting about 1,469 compromised devices and estimated losses of roughly $960,000 between February and July 2026. Vwork-compatible Gigabud samples have been found targeting 11 countries including Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, Thailand, and Türkiye, though only the Indonesian chain is confirmed.

The Hacker Newsupdated · 5d agofirst · 6d agoMalware in the wild 3 sources1

New Android malware encrypts files, steals data, and harasses victims

Zimperium details Mantax Otax, an Android malware combining ransomware, spyware, and harassment, spread via phishing APKs to Indonesian users.

Zimperium researchers report Mantax Otax is distributed through malicious APKs hosted outside Google Play via phishing and social engineering, then abuses Accessibility permissions for broad device control. It encrypts files with a C2-provided AES key on Android 9 and older, adds '.enc' extensions, and hosts ransom chats on Firebase; researchers exposed attacker chats via a Firebase misconfiguration. The malware steals lock-screen PINs, SMS one-time codes, contacts, WhatsApp and Telegram chats, and captures screens via MediaProjection, while version 2 adds jumpscare overlays and text-to-speech harassment. Google Play Protect already detects and blocks it on up-to-date devices via the App Defense Alliance.

BleepingComputerupdated · 5d agofirst · 6d agoMalware in the wild 6 sources

Malware bypasses browser checks to force install Chrome, Edge extensions

Elastic Security Labs detailed KREMLIN, a Brazilian banking malware that silently installs malicious Chrome and Edge extensions, with 1,515 confirmed infections.

Elastic Security Labs analyzed KREMLIN, a toolkit used by a Brazilian operation in at least seven campaigns since May 2025 that impersonates 12 banks to trick users into opening a JavaScript file disguised as a bank receipt or invoice. After anti-sandbox checks, it downloads Node.js, persists via a scheduled task, and fetches payload locations from an Ethereum smart contract, hiding payloads in JPEG images on Internet Archive. The toolkit bypasses Chromium integrity mechanisms to install unapproved Chrome/Edge extensions masquerading as AVSync that steal cookies, keylog form input, capture screenshots, and intercept HTTP traffic, while recent campaigns deployed the REMCOS RAT and earlier ones Pulsar RAT. Elastic confirmed 1,515 infected systems, almost all in Brazil, and disrupted the campaign by registering an anti-sandbox canary domain; the linked wallet handled roughly 20,800 USDT incoming and 19,000 USDT outgoing.

BleepingComputer · 10h agoMalware in the wild 3 sources

Sality, one of the longest

US and European authorities, with CrowdStrike and Shadowserver, disrupted the 20-year-old Sality peer-to-peer botnet, severing 15,000+ infected machines from operators.

US and European authorities disrupted the Sality botnet, active since at least 2003, in an operation involving the DOJ, CrowdStrike, the Shadowserver Foundation and agencies in Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. Researchers reverse-engineered the botnet's peer-to-peer architecture and injected false data into infected machines' 'super peer' lists, cutting more than 15,000 systems off from their operators. For the past eight years Sality primarily distributed EggJagger, malware that replaces clipboard cryptocurrency addresses and is estimated to have netted the operator at least $150,000. No arrests were announced, and CrowdStrike assesses the operator works from Russia's Bashkortostan region.

The Record · 14d agoMalware in the wild

Fake GTA 6 Installer Steals Browser Passwords, Discord Tokens and Crypto Data From Gamers

Huntress found fake GTA 6 installer ISOs spreading NJRAT, DCRAT, Mercurial Grabber and a Chaos ransomware wiper that steals credentials.

Huntress analyzed a malicious ISO disguised as a leaked GTA 6 build, distributed via SEO poisoning, torrent sites, and social media, with some images exceeding 100 GB and padded with junk data. The installer stages game-named executables in %TEMP% and deploys NJRAT, DCRAT, and the Mercurial Grabber infostealer, harvesting browser passwords, Discord tokens, Roblox and Minecraft session data, Windows product keys, and cryptocurrency details, with exfiltration via a Discord webhook. A Chaos ransomware variant launched through gta6.exe deletes shadow copies, disables Windows recovery, encrypts files up to 200 MB with AES, and overwrites larger files, effectively acting as a wiper attributed to the 'ASHA Hacker Team'. A Visual Basic script displays a fake 'license not found' error to conceal the already-installed payloads.

GBHackersupdated · 6d agofirst · 6d agoMalware in the wild 3 sources

ClearFake Deploys Crypto Stealer That Uses Vulnerable Driver to Kill EDR Security Tools

Cisco Talos details ClearFake's fake-CAPTCHA chain deploying ZigCryptoStealer with a BYOVD attack that kills EDR processes, observed at a Ukrainian government organization in April 2026.

ClearFake compromises websites, injects JavaScript via a malicious Cloudflare Worker, retrieves instructions from BNB Smart Chain contracts (EtherHiding), and presents a fake Google CAPTCHA that tricks Windows users into pasting a command that loads a remote library over WebDAV via rundll32. The crypto-stealer branch uses DLL side-loading with a signed Chrome component to launch ZigCryptoStealer, which hijacks clipboard cryptocurrency addresses, alongside a signed but vulnerable Windows driver used in a BYOVD attack to terminate EDR processes. A parallel branch delivers Amatera secondary payloads that install a hidden remote-access client providing operator desktop control, with Cisco Talos tracking the remote-loader activity as UAT-10820. Talos observed unusual remote library execution at a Ukrainian government organization in April 2026 and assesses the attacks are part of a broader theft operation rather than a single targeted campaign.

Cyber Security News · 7d agoMalware in the wild1

From Infostealer Log to Marketplace Listing: A Technical Walkthrough of the Credential Theft Pipeline

Cyble walkthrough maps how infostealer logs move from endpoint infection through aggregation and enrichment to dark web credential marketplace sales.

Cyble breaks the credential theft pipeline into stages: infostealer execution harvesting browser credential stores, cookies, session tokens, crypto wallets, and FTP configurations; aggregation of stealer logs via C2 panels into bundled archives; parsing and enrichment against previously leaked datasets; and final listing on dark web marketplaces. Enrichment adds employer and role context that raises prices and enables credential stuffing across reused passwords. The report advises SOC teams to monitor stealer logs and marketplace chatter early rather than waiting for breach alerts.

Cyble · 6d agoMalware1

Manic Android Malware Exfiltrates Data From Offline Phones via Nearby Infected Devices

ThreatFabric identified Manic, an Android banking malware and spyware targeting Ukrainian and European financial apps with novel offline Wi-Fi mesh data exfiltration via nearby infected devices.

ThreatFabric reported a new Android malware family called Manic combining banking fraud and surveillance capabilities, targeting 169 package IDs across Ukrainian banks, government and identity services, messaging apps, and Russian and European financial institutions. The malware uses phishing sites and dropper apps impersonating utilities for distribution and relies on accessibility services and notification permissions for keylogging, overlays, and remote control. It introduces a store-and-forward relay mechanism that stages encrypted data locally and relays it through nearby infected devices via Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth RFCOMM, or BLE GATT, supporting up to four hops when the primary device lacks internet access. Activity dates back to February 2026, with active development through late July.

The Hacker News · 26d agoMalware in the wild

16 Typosquatted RubyGems Packages Steal Browser Credentials and Crypto Wallets

Typosquatted RubyGems packages deliver the StubMaker infostealer, stealing browser credentials, crypto wallets, and Telegram data from Windows developers.

OpenSourceMalware discovered a typosquatting campaign on August 15, 2026, tracked as StubMaker, publishing 16 malicious RubyGems packages (e.g., ubnuler, brumdler, brundlef) that imitate popular Ruby dependencies. The gems use the extconf.rb install hook to fetch a 22 MB Rust-based loader from GitHub, which launches a Go-based stealer ("wincfg") containing a DLL that bypasses Chromium's app-bound encryption to extract browser credentials, payment cards, crypto wallets and seed phrases, and Telegram Desktop data. Stolen data is uploaded as a password-protected ZIP to Gofile, with the download link sent over plain HTTP. The same actor also deployed 37 typosquatted npm packages delivering the identical loader and infostealer, and abused RubyGems' namespace reuse to republish malicious versions of yanked gems.

The Hacker News · 26d agoMalware in the wild

When scanners miss the attack: how Cloudflare Client-Side Security protects storefronts

Cloudflare's Page Shield ML uncovered four malicious JavaScript campaigns on storefronts, including affiliate fraud and a remote-backdoor script, that VirusTotal and URLScan missed.

Cloudflare's Page Shield ML detected four client-side JavaScript operations (eight payloads) in live traffic on online storefronts, enabling affiliate commission hijacking, clickless affiliate theft via hidden iframes, user tracking with a remote-code backdoor, and cloaking of paid mobile visitors. Seven of the eight payloads were absent from VirusTotal and URLScan returned no malicious verdict for any, including a Lnkr-family payload indexed unclassified for roughly 2.5 years. Detection relies on a graph neural network over JavaScript syntax trees, an LLM second opinion on Workers AI, and a frontier-model ensemble voting across benign, magecart, other malware, and cryptomining labels.

Cloudflare Blog · 8h agoMalware in the wild

Cops, CrowdStrike disrupt Sality botnet by poisoning the network and diverting into sinkholes

Law enforcement and CrowdStrike disrupted the 23-year-old Sality P2P botnet, isolating 15,000+ infected machines and seizing linked domains.

International law enforcement, working with CrowdStrike and the Shadowserver Foundation, executed a peer-to-peer sinkhole operation against Sality, a botnet active since 2003 that delivered malware to more than 15,000 machines worldwide. Sality's primary payload for eight years was EggJagger, a clipboard hijacker that swaps copied bitcoin and ethereum wallet addresses with attacker-controlled ones, yielding at least $150,000 in stolen cryptocurrency. The US Justice Department, FBI, and DoD Office of Inspector General's Defense Criminal Investigative Service seized Sality-linked domains, with parallel action in Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania. The Shadowserver Foundation is coordinating with ISPs and CSIRTs to identify infections and notify victims.

The Register · Security · 15d agoMalware in the wild

Global sinkhole operation ends Sality botnet’s 23-year run

Law enforcement, CrowdStrike, and Shadowserver sinkholed the 23-year-old Sality P2P botnet, cutting 15,000+ infected machines from its operator.

Sality, active since 2003 as a file-infecting virus with two P2P networks (versions 3 and 4), distributed credential thieves, spam, proxies, and DDoS payloads, and most recently delivered the EggJagger clipboard hijacker that swapped cryptocurrency wallet addresses for at least $150,000 in operator profit. A coordinated sinkhole operation replaced the botnet's super-peer list with defender-controlled sinkholes, and investigators in the US, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania seized payload domains. The Shadowserver Foundation is coordinating ISP and CERT notifications to infected device owners.

Help Net Security · 15d agoMalware1

BraZetsu Malware Turns Compromised Windows Hosts Into Criminal Marketplace Inventory

Group-IB details BraZetsu, a modular Python Windows malware that monetizes compromised-host access through the Infected Marketplace for initial access brokers.

Group-IB attributes BraZetsu to the Exilware threat actor, believed to be native Portuguese speakers targeting Iberian and Latin American e-commerce, financial, industrial, and law enforcement victims. The framework, first observed in early May 2026, uses generative AI for data triage and target prioritization, steals browser histories and digital certificates, and hunts Brazilian CNAB financial remittance files. Access to compromised hosts is sold on the Infected Marketplace from roughly $5.80, letting buyers remotely deploy secondary payloads over WebSocket-linked infrastructure. Some samples evaded detection on VirusTotal; delivery likely uses VBS loaders from a domain also used to distribute the Ousaban banking trojan.

The Hacker News · 13d agoMalware in the wild