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SentinelOne secures patent for unique approach to uncovering exploits in their initial payload stage
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Hackers Deploy New SloppyRAT via ClickFix to Enable Ransomware Lateral Movement
Zscaler discovered SloppyRAT, a ClickFix-delivered RAT that gives ransomware operators reconnaissance, remote execution, and SOCKS proxy pivoting for lateral movement.
Zscaler identified SloppyRAT in June 2026, linked to a ransomware-related threat actor. The infection chain starts with a ClickFix lure abusing finger.exe over TCP port 79, then uses curl.exe, IronPython, CastleLoader, and CastleRAT before reflectively loading SloppyRAT as a DLL in memory. The RAT supports HTTPS command-and-control, system inventory, file operations, Defender tampering, and a reverse SOCKS proxy, with evasion features including runtime code encryption, indirect syscalls, certificate pinning, and a possible EtherHiding blockchain fallback. Its persistence code is buggy and the malware appears under development, but the pre-encryption foothold gives defenders a window to stop intrusions.
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International Operation Disrupts Sality P2P Botnet
US-led international operation with Europol, CrowdStrike, and Shadowserver sinkholed the 20-year-old Sality P2P botnet, once exceeding one million infected machines.
On August 31, 2026, authorities from the US, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania, supported by Europol, CrowdStrike, and the Shadowserver Foundation, disrupted the Sality P2P botnet by sinkholing communications and seizing domains. Sality has operated for over 20 years, at its peak controlling more than one million infected machines used for credential theft, spam, proxy services, crypto-theft, and DDoS attacks, with over 11 million unique IP addresses linked to its infrastructure since 2017. The disruption exploited the botnet's super-peer reputation mechanism by removing legitimate peers via protocol-level manipulation and inserting sinkhole entries into emptied peer lists.
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TuxBot v3: Inside an IoT Botnet Framework With LLM
Unit 42 uncovers TuxBot v3, an LLM-assisted IoT botnet framework with 17-architecture builds, Telnet brute-forcing, and DDoS capabilities.
Palo Alto Unit 42 identified TuxBot v3 Evolution, a modular IoT botnet framework derived from AISURU, Wuhan-lineage botnets, and MHDDoS. The C-based bot brute-forces Telnet with 1,496 credential pairs, targets over 30 IoT device families, and communicates with a Go-based C2 over encrypted TCP with multiple fallback mechanisms including DGA, P2P, and DNS TXT. LLM-assisted development left hallucinated crypto implementations and broken exploit modules in the analyzed samples, though roughly 70% of core functionality works. Researchers warn polished production builds likely exist, raising the threat potential.
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