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⚡ Weekly Recap: Instagram Account Hacks, Android Zero
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DPRK APTs: Ted backdoor and curlRAT target South Korean media and automotive sectors
Rapid7 uncovered a DPRK-linked Linux toolkit using a HAProxy-embedded ted backdoor, SSH keylogger, and curlRAT against South Korean media and automotive firms.
Rapid7 Labs identified a previously undocumented framework attributed with medium confidence to DPRK actors, targeting South Korean automotive and media organizations likely since early 2025. The toolkit embeds a backdoor compiled into HAProxy 2.8.12 using its filter API, plus trojanized crond, agetty, atd, sshd, and polkitd, an SSH keylogger storing credentials under /var/lib/sshd/, and a curl-based RAT with a watchdog thread. It enables remote command execution, malicious script injection into served webpages (a watering-hole loop), credential harvesting, and long-term surveillance. Hardcoded C2s are associated with APT37 via ThreatFox, and exposed groupware portals and mail servers align with Kimsuky tradecraft; the initial access vector and any CVE remain unconfirmed.
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APT28-Linked HOOKEDGE Backdoor Targets European Government and Diplomatic Organizations
Recorded Future links new HOOKEDGE batch-script backdoor campaigns against Romanian, Spanish and Turkish government targets to Russia's APT28 (BlueDelta).
Recorded Future's Insikt Group identified campaigns deploying the previously undocumented HOOKEDGE backdoor against government and diplomatic organizations in Romania, Spain and Türkiye from late September 2025 to early April 2026. The lightweight Windows batch backdoor is delivered via macro-enabled Word documents and attributed with moderate confidence to APT28 (Fancy Bear, tracked as BlueDelta), described as the evolutionary successor to HEADLACE, using webhook.site for C2, payload staging and exfiltration. HOOKEDGE fetches .cmd payloads and returns output through headless Microsoft Edge HTTP requests, maintains a 30-minute scheduled task, and a second-stage implant gives high-value targets five-minute beaconing for interactive operator tasking.
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HBO Max Reddit Account Hijacked to Spread PasteSwitch ClickFix Malware
Hijacked HBO Max verified Reddit account ran 108 ClickFix malvertising ads delivering AMOS and Amatera stealers plus crypto clippers to macOS and Windows users.
Threat actors hijacked HBO Max's verified Reddit account (u/hbomax) to run 108 malicious ClickFix ads over 48 hours in a campaign tracked as PasteSwitch, researched by Hudson Rock and ADAMnetworks. macOS victims were served curl | zsh chains deploying MacSync and Atomic macOS Stealer (AMOS), which harvest browser credentials, Telegram data, Apple Notes, and macOS passwords, while fake Ledger, Trezor, and Exodus apps targeted BIP39 seed phrases. Windows users received an InstallFix chain using an MP3/HTA polyglot with mshta and PowerShell, scheduled-task persistence, AMSI disabling, and in-memory Amatera Stealer that hid C2 traffic (77.91.65.13:443) behind a facebook.com TLS SNI. AnimateClipper and ZigClipper components swapped copied crypto wallet addresses and used Binance Smart Chain contracts as mutable C2 dead drops; Reddit paused the ads and the initial access path remains undisclosed.
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An AI-Assisted Cyber Attack: Inside a Unit 42 Investigation
Unit 42 investigated a ransom attack in which frontier AI agents autonomously breached an enterprise network, compressing weeks of tradecraft into under 10 hours.
Unit 42 incident responders documented an intrusion where a single human operator directed frontier AI agents to breach an enterprise network autonomously as part of a ransom attack. The agents executed more than 50 MITRE ATT&CK techniques in under 10 hours, work that would normally require roughly two weeks of human red-team effort. They breached a public-facing web service, mapped internal microservices, scraped hard-coded secrets from code repositories, harvested root credentials from the secrets manager, and hijacked CI/CD builds to exfiltrate cloud access keys. The attacker also used stolen cloud keys to repurpose the victim's AI endpoints as post-compromise infrastructure and left behind an 80-page AI-generated security audit documenting dozens of exploited findings.
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Hackers Exploit Critical FortiGate Flaw to Deploy AI-Assisted PivotC2 RAT
SOCRadar says attackers exploit FortiGate CVE-2025-25249 to deploy the PivotC2 Node.js RAT, compromising 178 of 30,000 targeted devices and stealing credentials.
SOCRadar's Threat Research Unit reports active exploitation of CVE-2025-25249, a CVSS 9.8 heap-based buffer overflow in the cw_acd daemon of FortiOS and FortiSwitchManager, via crafted CAPWAP requests to UDP port 5246, compromising at least 178 of 30,000 targeted internet-exposed FortiGate devices since July 2026. The campaign deploys PivotC2, a Node.js RAT that provides interactive shells, SOCKS5/HTTP proxying, port forwarding, network scanning, and automated configuration harvesting that decrypts stored FortiGate credentials, including VPN pre-shared keys, SSL-VPN credentials, and LDAP secrets. Russian-language artifacts, AD enumeration, browser credential theft, RDP enablement, and exfiltration of Exchange .pst files to Wasabi S3 point to a Russian-speaking, financially motivated group; two US organizations confirmed full-network intrusions. Fixes include FortiOS 7.6.4/7.4.9/7.2.12/7.0.18+ and FortiSwitchManager 7.2.7/7.0.6+, plus blocking CAPWAP on internet-facing interfaces.
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CISA Warns Water Utilities: Find Your Exposed PLCs Before Attackers Do
CISA urged water utilities to secure internet-exposed PLCs after July 2026 attacks compromised over 100 US water and wastewater systems, suspected Iran-linked.
CISA's exposure-reduction guidance, published August 21, follows July 2026 attacks in which threat actors remotely accessed PLCs connected directly through cellular modems, changed device IP addresses and passwords, and in some cases disabled alarms and shutdown processes without notifying operators. Iran is the suspected actor, though officials stopped short of formal attribution. CISA recommends routing remote access through centrally managed secure gateways, phishing-resistant MFA, unique credentials, and external scanning of industrial protocols such as Modbus, EtherNet/IP, DNP3, BACnet and OPC UA.
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HTTP/2 CONTINUATION Flood technique can be exploited in DoS attacks
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Threat actors continue to exploit Log4j flaws, Microsoft Warns
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Microsoft September 2026 Patch Tuesday fixes 966 flaws, 2 zero-days
Microsoft's September 2026 Patch Tuesday fixes a record 966 flaws, including two Windows zero-days actively exploited to gain SYSTEM privileges.
Microsoft's September 2026 Patch Tuesday addresses a record 966 vulnerabilities, including 105 rated Critical, 81 of them remote code execution bugs. Two zero-days were actively exploited: a Windows Update Stack link-following flaw and a Windows ALPC heap-based buffer overflow, both allowing local elevation to SYSTEM privileges. The ALPC flaw was reported by Volexity and Proofpoint researchers, while the Update Stack flaw was credited to Romain Deperne and the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Centre. Microsoft shared no details on how the flaws were exploited in attacks.
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CISA Flags Four Security Flaws Under Active Exploitation in Latest KEV Update
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Iran-Linked Hackers Use Fake LinkedIn Job Offers to Deploy NodeRabbit and PollCat RATs
Iran-linked Mirage Kitten targets software engineers with fake LinkedIn recruiter coding tests deploying new NodeRabbit and PollCat RATs.
Kaspersky researchers link the campaign to Mirage Kitten (also tracked as UNC1549, Smoke Sandstorm, Nimbus Manticore), with victims in aviation, aerospace and fintech in Egypt, Ethiopia and Afghanistan. Trojanized npm dependencies (colorized_terminal, pretty-log) bundled in coding-challenge archives launch the Node.js implants across Windows, Linux and macOS. NodeRabbit uses AES-256-GCM-encrypted C2 via Azure, and its third variant persists through a fake GitHub Copilot Helper VS Code extension plus Git post-merge/post-checkout hooks. PollCat is an obfuscated JavaScript RAT that registers with C2 before OTP authentication and inventories tools from 24 security vendors.
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⚡ Weekly Recap: AI-Powered PLC Attacks, GitLab Attacks, Stripe Key Leaks and More
US agencies warn of AI-assisted attacks on exposed Siemens PLCs; the week also saw GitLab CVE-2026-19478 exploited and trojanized npm packages found.
The weekly recap leads with a US government warning that threat actors use AI-generated scripts and Censys/ZoomEye scanning to attack internet-exposed Siemens S7 PLCs in water, energy and manufacturing, calling it an active threat. Other stories include active exploitation of GitLab CVE-2026-19478 (CVSS 9.4, unauthenticated project rewriting), 14 trojanized npm packages delivering the RedC2 4.0 Linux backdoor, and the Zombie Card attack that revives expired Visa cards for contactless payment fraud. It also covers suspected Russian clusters UNC6293, UNC7005 and UNC5976 phishing campaigns, a faster Cloudflare Workers Spectre JWT leak, and a bespoke Cl0p JSP web shell deployed after exploiting PTC Windchill flaws.
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China-Linked Fire Ant Hijacks Cisco Routers to Steal Credentials and Blind Security Logs
China-nexus espionage group Fire Ant compromised Cisco IOS XR routers and TACACS servers to harvest credentials, capture traffic and suppress logs.
Sygnia investigated an intrusion in which Fire Ant expanded beyond VMware hypervisors to Cisco IOS XR routers, TACACS servers and Linux management hosts. The actor deployed purpose-built router implants that hid a GRE tunnel, filtered log messages, captured PCAPs uploaded to external FTP servers, and used TacTap to inject a library into tac_plus and steal TACACS credentials obfuscated with a single-byte XOR key of 0xEF. A Linux backdoor named BridgeAgent masqueraded as a Zabbix agent, persisted via a root systemd unit, disguised itself as /usr/bin/gnome-shell and received commands over TLS on port 443. The group also used Medusa and REPTILE rootkits, SSH backdoors and renamed binaries impersonating SentinelOne and Cybereason agents, while suppressing logs, disabling SELinux and rewriting login history. Sygnia assesses strong overlap with UNC3886 and published IoCs.
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SilkParasite Espionage Campaign Targets Central Asian Governments with Five New RATs
Bitdefender reports SilkParasite, a China-nexus espionage cluster targeting Central Asian governments with seven RATs, five newly documented, delivered via spearphished RAR archives.
Bitdefender Labs assesses with medium confidence that SilkParasite, first discovered in late 2025, is a China-nexus cluster targeting government bodies in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Georgia. Attacks use password-protected RAR archives with malicious Office documents, macro-triggered DLL sideloading, and checks for running Kaspersky AV before execution. The arsenal spans seven RAT families in .NET, C++, Go, and JavaScript with plugin architectures and diverse C2 channels including Google Drive and HTTP cookie/ETag headers; roughly 65 DriveSilkRAT infections were observed, mostly in Asia. Ties to China include BLOODALCHEMY (a Deed RAT/ShadowPad descendant) and an improved SpiceRAT used by SneakyChef, with traces of AI-assisted development in the tooling and lures.
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KREMLIN Banking Malware Hijacks Chrome and Edge to Steal Credentials and Session Tokens
Elastic Security Labs details KREMLIN, Brazilian banking malware using malicious Chrome/Edge extensions and Ethereum smart contracts to steal credentials and session tokens.
Elastic Security Labs documents KREMLIN (tracked as REF9334), a Brazilian banking malware toolkit active since at least May 2025 that impersonates a dozen Brazilian banks. It uses multi-stage JavaScript loaders, a C++ installer that DLL-sideloads via a legitimate SentinelOne binary, and a malicious Chrome/Edge extension named 'AVSync System Inc.' Ethereum smart contracts act as dead-drop resolvers for C2 endpoints, a shift that occurred May 19, 2026, making infrastructure hard to disrupt. The extension harvests cookies, sessionStorage/localStorage, browsing history, screenshots, and full page HTML via WebSocket plus CSS-disguised polling endpoints. The group has run seven distinct campaigns and also distributes Pulsar RAT and Remcos RAT.
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China's AI-Enabled APT Operations Are Getting Interesting
Bitdefender links seven RAT families, five previously undocumented, to China-nexus espionage actor SilkParasite using AI-assisted malware development against Central Asian governments.
A Bitdefender report attributes seven remote access tool families to a single actor dubbed SilkParasite, with medium confidence a China-nexus group targeting governments in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. The RATs are written in .NET, C++, Go and JavaScript, use C2 via Google Drive and protocols like HTTP, DNS and TCP, and employ modular plugin architectures with regular rotation of infrastructure, encryption material and persistence artifacts. Evidence of AI-assisted development includes leftover test functions, placeholder encryption keys, and GoginRAT and NomadRAT sharing a high-level architecture despite different languages, suggesting a specification implemented twice with AI. The newsletter also covers the US Operation Economic Outcast sanctioning six MOIS-linked Iranian hackers, including hands-on-keyboard operators who targeted US critical infrastructure.
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