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The AI Malware Maturity Gap

Recorded Future introduces AIM3, a five-level maturity model for AI malware, showing current attacker AI use is mostly AI-assisted rather than autonomous.

Recorded Future proposes AIM3, a five-level model defining AI malware from LLM-translated to LLM-embedded, spanning experimentation to fully autonomous agentic campaigns. Public examples remain early-stage: PROMPTFLUX uses Google Gemini to rewrite its VBScript dropper (Level 1), while Lamehug/PROMPTSTEAL, attributed to APT28, invokes the HuggingFace API to generate reconnaissance commands (Level 3). The authors argue most current AI malware augments existing tradecraft rather than enabling one-click autonomous attacks.

Recorded Future · 21d agoResearch

Leaked Russian Cyber-Operations Training Materials

Leaked Bauman university records reveal a formalized Russian pipeline training GRU cyber personnel, linking a graduate to Sandworm's Military Unit 74455.

Leaked training materials from Bauman university describe a force-generation mechanism feeding graduates into General Staff components, including the GRU and directorates responsible for protected communications, cryptography and information security. A 2024 graduate of Department No. 4, Aleksei Kondrashov, was linked to Military Unit 74455, the GRU unit known as Sandworm, which conducted destructive attacks including the 2017 NotPetya attack. Researchers say the leak shows Russian cyber capability is institutionally sustained through recruitment pipelines beyond the familiar APT28 and Sandworm brand names.

Schneier on Security · 15d agoThreat actor

8,539 Reasons To Rethink How Vulnerabilities Get Patched

Rapid7 counted 8,539 high and critical CVEs in Q2 2026, double last year, with PoC availability up 76%.

Rapid7's Q2 2026 Threat Landscape Report tallied 8,539 high- and critical-severity vulnerability disclosures, twice the number recorded in Q2 2025, with newly disclosed flaws having public proof-of-concept code up 76% year over year. Of newly exploited vulnerabilities, 62% were network-exploitable and required neither authentication nor user interaction. Fake CAPTCHA and ClickFix social engineering accounted for 31.8% of incident response cases, the United States recorded 881 listed ransomware victims, and APT28 exploited SOHO routers for DNS hijacking while Iranian groups targeted US industrial control and OT systems.

Help Net Security · 27d agoResearch