Search: “midnight-blizzard”

Anthropic Says Russian Hackers Used Claude AI to Automate Malware Evasion

Anthropic disrupted Midnight Blizzard campaigns where AI agents automatically rebuilt malware to evade detection, targeting 20+ government and defense organizations.

Anthropic's threat intelligence report documents the Russian state-nexus actor Midnight Blizzard using Claude to automatically monitor, modify, and redeploy malware until it evaded security products. The campaign hit more than 20 organizations, including Ukrainian and European government ministries, defense bodies, embassies, and think tanks, with mailbox theft from two drone component manufacturers and compromise of hotel guest Wi-Fi via DNS hijacking. The report also describes financially motivated groups GTG-50020 and GTG-50021 targeting AI credentials, including a prompt-injection attack on an automated evaluation sandbox that yielded production API keys and attempts to reach a pre-release Claude model across roughly 30 AI companies.

SecurityWeek·updated 13:01 UTC · 10h ago·first Sep 11, 08:47 UTC · 5d agoThreat actor in the wild 18 sources4

Nonprofit that tracks meteors taken down by "critical blow" from a cyberattack

The International Meteor Organization says a cyberattack dealt a critical blow to its infrastructure, taking much of its site offline for weeks.

The International Meteor Organization (IMO), a nonprofit coordinating amateur and professional meteor observations since 1988, reported a cyberattack that took much of its website offline. The organization expects several weeks of partial downtime while transitioning to new infrastructure and is prioritizing fireball reporting through alternate channels. The attack vector and whether any data was accessed remain undisclosed; the IMO's observation databases and WGN journal are widely used in the field.

Ars Technica · Security·21:08 UTC · 2h agoData breach in the wild 2 sources

Midnight Blizzard Targets Travelers via Captive Portals

Infosecurity Magazine·Aug 3, 14:30 UTC · Aug 3, 2026Malware

CaptiveCrunch: Midnight Blizzard Weaponizes Hotel Wi-Fi Captive Portals to Steal Microsoft 365 Credentials

Zscaler details CaptiveCrunch: Midnight Blizzard's Storm-2945 compromises hotel Wi-Fi captive portals to redirect guests and harvest Microsoft 365 credentials via device code phishing.

Zscaler ThreatLabz analyzed the CaptiveCrunch credential theft campaign first reported by Microsoft on July 31. Microsoft attributes the activity to Storm-2945, a sub-cluster of Russia-linked Midnight Blizzard (APT29, Cozy Bear, NOBELIUM, BlueBravo). The actor manipulates DNS and HTTP traffic on captive portal networks at hotels and conference centers, redirecting victims to attacker-controlled infrastructure for Microsoft 365 credential harvesting, device code phishing, and malware delivery. Evidence indicates shared captive portal services were compromised rather than each venue being breached individually.

Zscaler ThreatLabz·Aug 11, 22:06 UTC · Aug 11, 2026Threat actor in the wild

Russian hackers abuse hotel Wi-Fi networks to steal Microsoft 365 credentials and deploy malware

Help Net Security·Aug 4, 00:00 UTC · Aug 4, 2026Malware1

Nightmare-Eclipse Strikes Again with 'ShieldCrash' Windows Exploit

A researcher known as Nightmare-Eclipse published another zero-day exploit, dubbed ShieldCrash, targeting Windows Defender.

Dark Reading reports that the disgruntled researcher tracked as Nightmare-Eclipse continued a vendetta against Microsoft by publishing a new zero-day exploit named ShieldCrash for Windows Defender. The brief report does not detail affected versions, exploitation prerequisites, or whether exploitation has been observed.

Dark Reading·Sep 10, 15:29 UTC · 6d agoExploit / PoC1

FrostyGoop’s Zoom-In: A Closer Look into the Malware Artifacts, Behaviors and Network Communications

Unit 42 dissects FrostyGoop OT malware, which sent Modbus TCP commands to disrupt heating for 600+ apartment buildings in Ukraine.

Palo Alto Unit 42 analyzed new FrostyGoop/BUSTLEBERM samples, the ninth known ICS-centric malware, first used against a Ukrainian municipal energy company by sending Modbus TCP commands to ENCO control devices. The attack caused a two-day heating outage affecting over 600 apartment buildings during sub-zero temperatures. The Go-compiled malware accepts Modbus register operations and timing parameters via command-line arguments or a JSON configuration file, uses an obscure open-source Modbus library, and checks the Windows BeingDebugged flag to evade debuggers. Unit 42 telemetry recorded over 1 million Modbus TCP devices exposed to the internet between September and October 2024.

Palo Alto Unit 42·Aug 19, 12:04 UTC · 28d agoMalware in the wild

Chypothermia: Clock Freezing for Static Side-channel Attacks

Chypothermia attack uses cryogenic cooling to disable clock and voltage sensors, evading detection and blocking key zeroization on OpenTitan root of trust.

Chypothermia is a static side-channel attack that exposes chips to cryogenic temperatures, disrupting on-chip mixed-signal components to disable the clock sensor, clock generation circuit, and voltage sensors without electrical tampering. Combined with Chypnosis (IEEE S&P 2026), it halts the clock while evading temperature-based anomaly detection. It was implemented on multiple FPGA/SoC platforms and applied to the OpenTitan root of trust's alert handler, evading detection and preventing key zeroization. The authors also propose an FPGA-compatible self-heating sensor as a countermeasure.

arXiv cs.CR·Sep 10, 12:12 UTC · 6d agoResearch

Untracked Nightmares: The Threats Hiding Behind Commodity Infrastructure

Unit 42 exposes CL-CRI-1171, a pay-per-install network spreading malware like Insomnia RAT via YouTube channels and SEO poisoning for over two years.

Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 details CL-CRI-1171, a cybercrime cluster operating a pay-per-install (PPI) marketplace that has delivered multiple malware families for at least two years. The group used at least eleven YouTube gaming channels with hundreds of thousands of followers, plus SEO poisoning promoting trojanized software such as a Bluetooth driver and WinDirStat, infecting gamers and corporate endpoints including critical infrastructure and government entities. A single shared loader delivered payloads including Insomnia RAT, ARKTunnel, Docro Hijacker, GCleaner and Socks5Systemz between July 2025 and April 2026, with more than 10,000 distinct loader samples and over 200 rotating C2 domains identified. YouTube terminated the malicious channels after Unit 42 notified the platform.

Palo Alto Unit 42·Sep 9, 10:00 UTC · 7d agoMalware in the wild1

ShieldBreak: New Windows Zero-Day Bypasses Microsoft’s RoguePlanet Patch

Researcher Chaotic Eclipse published a PoC bypassing Microsoft's CVE-2026-50656 Defender patch, enabling SYSTEM-level code execution on fully patched Windows systems.

Security researcher Chaotic Eclipse released a proof-of-concept for ShieldBreak, a Microsoft Defender zero-day that fully bypasses the patch for CVE-2026-50656 (RoguePlanet), a race condition in the Malware Protection Engine (mpengine.dll) allowing SYSTEM-level code execution. The PoC was tested on Windows 11 25H2 and Windows Server 2025 with a 100% success rate, and Windows 10 is also vulnerable though not supported by the PoC; the flaw may also leak 8 bytes of memory. Microsoft's MSRC had criticized the researcher's repeated uncoordinated disclosures, including YellowKey (BitLocker bypass), GreenPlasma, and LegacyHive (User Profile Service LPE).

Security Affairs·Aug 12, 08:08 UTC · Aug 12, 2026Exploit / PoCCVE-2026-50656

Chaotic Eclipse Releases GenDigital Avast Antivirus ZeroDay PrettyPrague

Researcher Chaotic Eclipse released PrettyPrague, a PoC zero-day privilege escalation exploit against fully patched GenDigital Avast Antivirus.

Security researcher Chaotic Eclipse (also known as INFINITE NIGHTMARE or MSNightmare) published a PoC named PrettyPrague exploiting a zero-day privilege escalation flaw in Avast Antivirus. The PoC abuses a flaw in the Avast Sandbox to dump the Windows SAM database and spawn a SYSTEM-level shell, reportedly working on fully patched Avast and patched Windows 11 25H2. The researcher believes the flaw may also affect other GenDigital products such as AVG and Norton. It follows his recent HardBreacher PoC for a Kaspersky Endpoint Security privilege escalation flaw.

Security Affairs·Sep 1, 14:33 UTC · 15d agoExploit / PoC

Serial Microsoft 0-day hunter drops yet another Defender exploit

Researcher Nightmare Eclipse released ShieldCrash, a Microsoft Defender zero-day PoC that bypasses September patches and reads files as SYSTEM.

Zero-day researcher Nightmare Eclipse (MSNightmare) published ShieldCrash, their 11th Microsoft zero-day, a proof-of-concept bypass of the ShieldBreak patch (CVE-2026-69414), which itself had bypassed the fix for RoguePlanet (CVE-2026-50656). ShieldCrash works on Windows 10, Windows 11, and Windows Server systems that have applied the September 2026 patches and allows arbitrary file reads as SYSTEM, though not arbitrary writes or a full SYSTEM shell. Microsoft has not said when it plans to patch the issue. The researcher recently also released zero-days affecting CrowdStrike Falcon (FalconFlank), Kaspersky endpoint antivirus (HardBreacher, patched), and Gen Digital's Avast (PrettyPrague).

The Register · Security·Sep 9, 17:23 UTC · 7d agoExploit / PoCCVE-2026-69414CVE-2026-50656

Chaotic Eclipse Released A PoC For NVIDIA GreenSection Memory Corruption Zero-Day

Researcher Chaotic Eclipse released GreenSection, a PoC exploit for an NVIDIA Windows user-mode shared-memory flaw enabling out-of-bounds writes and potential dwm.exe compromise.

Researcher Chaotic Eclipse (aka Nightmare Eclipse) released a PoC named GreenSection for a zero-day in NVIDIA's Windows user-mode components. Multiple NVIDIA components share a global memory section in BaseNamedObjects with full read/write access to all users; although checks prevent misuse, runtime reuse of section data can cause an out-of-bounds write. The unstable PoC crashes applications using Vulkan or OpenGL and could potentially cross user boundaries or compromise the Windows Desktop Window Manager (dwm.exe), though impact was not fully investigated. The researcher recently published similar zero-day PoCs against Kaspersky Endpoint Security, Avast Antivirus, and CrowdStrike Falcon.

Security Affairs·Sep 7, 13:42 UTC · 9d agoExploit / PoC 2 sources

Campaign Evolution: pseudo

Unit 42 traces the pseudo-Darkleech campaign's 2016 shift from Angler to Neutrino to Rig exploit kits and rotating ransomware payloads.

Unit 42 documents how the pseudo-Darkleech exploit kit campaign evolved through 2016, switching from Angler EK to Neutrino EK in June and to Rig EK in September after Neutrino ceased operations. Payloads rotated from TeslaCrypt to CryptXXX, CrypMIC, and finally Cerber ransomware by October 2016. Injected script on compromised websites changed from 12,000-18,000 character obfuscated blocks to short, unobfuscated hidden iframes starting July 1, 2016.

Palo Alto Unit 42·Aug 17, 09:54 UTC · Aug 17, 2026Threat actor in the wild

“Network outage” disrupts Westfield Public Schools in New Jersey as ransomware group posts samples

A ransomware group posted stolen data samples after a districtwide network outage disrupted Westfield Public Schools in New Jersey.

Westfield Public Schools in New Jersey experienced a districtwide network outage during the first week of school, disrupting communications and digital instruction while classrooms stayed open. The district initially attributed the disruption to networking hardware failure across all schools and offices. A ransomware group has since posted data samples, indicating extortion activity tied to the incident.

DataBreaches.net·Sep 9, 12:09 UTC · 7d agoRansomware

Chaotic Eclipse Releases Kaspersky Zero

Researcher Chaotic Eclipse released HardBreacher, a PoC privilege-escalation exploit for Kaspersky Endpoint Security on fully patched Windows 11 25H2.

Security researcher Chaotic Eclipse, also known as INFINITE NIGHTMARE and Nightmare-Eclipse, released a PoC zero-day exploit named HardBreacher targeting Kaspersky Endpoint Security v14.0.0.504. The exploit achieves privilege escalation on fully patched Windows 11 25H2, creating a DLL in System32 with full user permissions and potentially disrupting Kaspersky's UI process and file-access controls. The PoC is unstable and may require repeated attempts; Kaspersky claims it has already addressed the vulnerability.

Security Affairs·Sep 1, 09:34 UTC · 15d agoExploit / PoC1

New Chaos Variant Targets Misconfigured Cloud Deployments, Adds SOCKS Proxy

Darktrace says the Chaos botnet now targets misconfigured cloud deployments like Hadoop and added a SOCKS proxy for traffic relaying.

Darktrace identified a new 64-bit ELF variant of the Chaos botnet targeting misconfigured cloud deployments, expanding beyond the malware's traditional focus on routers and edge devices. Captured in a deliberately misconfigured Hadoop honeypot instance, the intrusion began with an HTTP request creating an application that ran embedded shell commands to fetch the Chaos agent binary from pan.tenire[.]com, set chmod 777 permissions, execute it, and delete the artifact to reduce forensic traces. The restructured variant adds a SOCKS proxy feature letting compromised systems ferry attacker traffic, while removing SSH-based spread and router-exploit functions, suggesting monetization beyond crypto mining and DDoS-for-hire. Possible Chinese origin is suggested by language artifacts and infrastructure; the delivery domain was previously used in Silver Fox's Operation Silk Lure phishing campaign delivering ValleyRAT.

The Hacker News·Aug 18, 12:13 UTC · 29d agoMalware1

Mythos Vulnerability Firehose Hits a Human Bottleneck

Analysis of Project Glasswing findings shows only a fraction of discovered vulnerabilities have reached disclosure and even fewer are fixed.

Dark Reading reports that an analysis of Project Glasswing findings shows only a fraction of the vulnerabilities discovered by the program have reached disclosure, and an even smaller number have been fixed. The article examines how the volume of findings from the discovery program is bottlenecked by limited human triage and remediation capacity. The piece highlights growing tension between high-volume vulnerability discovery and the industry's ability to process, disclose and patch reports.

Dark Reading·Sep 9, 21:19 UTC · 7d agoResearch