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Malspam Targeting Brazil Continues to Evolve
Brazilian malspam campaigns continue evolving, abusing Google URL shortener and Dropbox and using Squiblydoo plus DLL side-loading to deploy likely infostealing botnet malware.
A June 2017 Brazilian malspam campaign spoofed IPTU tax notification emails, using the recipient's address as the sender, and abused Google's URL shortener and Dropbox to deliver a zip containing a malicious Windows shortcut (.lnk) file. The LNK used the Squiblydoo technique (regsvr32.exe) to download and execute a scriptlet with elevated privileges, retrieving a signed G-Buster Browser Defense executable alongside a malicious fltLib.dll loaded via side-loading, likely an information-stealing botnet. Post-infection HTTP traffic exposed over 400 infected Windows hosts, mostly in Brazil, with 2,132 Banload-tagged samples observed in the first half of 2017.
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The Gopher in the Room: Analysis of GoLang Malware in the Wild
Unit 42 analysis of 10,700 Go-compiled malware samples shows steady growth in the wild, with 92% targeting Windows and top families including Veil, GoBot2, and HERCULES.
Unit 42 collected roughly 10,700 unique Go-compiled malware samples and found that Go usage by malware developers has steadily risen in recent months. About 92% of samples targeted Windows and 75% were attributed to known families, led by Veil, GoBot2, and HERCULES. The most prevalent groupings were penetration testing tools, remote access Trojans, and backdoors. Statically linked Go binaries average 4.65MB, which can complicate phishing delivery but sometimes causes antivirus products to skip or fail scanning.
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Understanding Angler Exploit Kit
Unit 42 examines Angler EK operations, including rapid zero-day adoption, fileless Bedep infections, and ransomware payloads like TeslaCrypt and CryptXXX.
Unit 42 published the second part of its Angler EK analysis, covering the kit's history since 2013, its SaaS rental model, and its focus on Flash, Internet Explorer, and Silverlight exploits. Angler integrated the CVE-2015-5119 Flash zero-day from the Hacking Team leak within hours and later added exploits for CVE-2015-2419 and CVE-2016-0034 roughly a month after Microsoft patched them. Campaigns use Angler to deliver ransomware such as CryptoWall, TeslaCrypt, and CryptXXX, plus banking trojans and stealers via EITest. Since August 2014, Angler has used fileless, in-memory execution, most often for Bedep, which later downloads CryptXXX and click-fraud malware.
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Campaign Evolution: EITest from October through December 2016
Unit 42 details the EITest campaign's late-2016 changes: gates and obfuscation dropped, with Rig EK variants delivering ransomware and infostealers.
Unit 42 tracks the EITest campaign through late 2016, noting it abandoned the gate between compromised websites and exploit kit landing pages after its October 2016 report, and stopped obfuscating injected script URLs by October 15. The campaign primarily uses the Rig-E (Empire Pack) variant and sometimes Rig-V of Rig EK to deliver Cerber and CryptoMix ransomware plus infostealers such as Gootkit, the Chthonic banking Trojan, Ursnif variants, and Latentbot. Tracked since 2014 by Malwarebytes Labs and others, EITest targets unpatched Windows systems without specific victimology.
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Automatically Detecting DNS Hijacking in Passive DNS
Unit 42's machine learning pipeline detected 6,729 DNS hijacking events between March and September 2024, hitting political parties, ISPs, and universities.
Unit 42 processes roughly 167 million new DNS records daily and applies a machine learning model using 74 features over 169 TB of passive DNS and geolocation data to flag hijacked domains. From March to September 2024 the pipeline screened over 29 billion records and classified 6,729 as DNS hijacking, averaging 38 detections per day; a new model detects hijacks in customer traffic within about 10 minutes. Notable cases include a Hungarian political party's hijacked domain, defacement of a large utility company and ISP, and university and research center domains repurposed for illicit gambling. DNS hijacking typically relies on stolen registrar or DNS provider credentials or cache poisoning, enabling MitM attacks, phishing, drive-by downloads, and scams.
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EITest Campaign Evolution: From Angler EK to Neutrino and Rig
Unit 42 details the EITest campaign's shift from Angler to Neutrino and Rig exploit kits while distributing ransomware, downloaders, and banking trojans.
Unit 42 updated its tracking of the EITest campaign, first identified in October 2014, which compromises websites with injected scripts that redirect victims through a gate to exploit kits. After Angler EK disappeared in June 2016, EITest switched to Neutrino and then primarily used Rig EK by August 2016. In September 2016 the campaign began using hex-obfuscated JavaScript and simplified gate URLs, while continuing to distribute payloads including Gootkit, Cerber, Bart, CryptFile2, Vawtrak, Ursnif, and Tinba. Gate infrastructure consistently reused IP blocks such as 85.93.0.0/24 even as domain names changed.
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Upatre Continued to Evolve with new Anti
Unit 42 analyzes an undocumented Upatre downloader variant with VM detection via process hashing, packed code, disabled Windows defenses and Namecoin .bit C2 domains.
Unit 42 analyzed an Upatre downloader variant compiled in December 2016 that went largely undetected by automated systems, featuring heavy code flow obscuration, on-demand decryption of network communications, and novel virtual machine detection. The sample enumerates running processes, computes CRC32 hashes XORed with a hard-coded key, and sleeps if analysis-related processes such as vmtoolsd.exe or python.exe are found. It masquerades with Google Chrome icons, disables Windows Defender, Firewall and other security services, injects code into msiexec.exe, and resolves .bit Namecoin domains like bookreader[.]bit via hardcoded OpenNIC DNS servers over TCP.
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Google’s New Search Redirects Make It Harder to Check Where Links Lead Before Clicking
Malwarebytes reports Google's new encoded google.com/goto?url= redirects break hover-preview link checking, weakening a common phishing defense.
Google now routes some search results through opaque google.com/goto?url= redirects using custom encoding, so browser link previews no longer reveal the true destination, only the claimed label above the result. Malwarebytes found the final destination is visible only in the redirect response's Location header, complicating hover-based safety checks as well as scraping, archiving, and audit tools. The change arrives amid malvertising, search-result poisoning, and fake installer campaigns like the recent Node.js infostealer lure. Google says it deploys measures against evolving abuse but did not explain the change.
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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.
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AI helps scammers build convincing antivirus renewal pages
Malwarebytes found scammers using AI to build polished fake antivirus renewal pages impersonating Avast, harvesting names, emails and phone numbers for follow-up fraud calls.
Malwarebytes analyzed a fake Avast renewal site targeting Belgian users in French, claiming a €129.99 Avast Premium Security renewal and collecting name, email address and Belgian mobile number through a cancellation form. Leftover code comments written in polite French and other stylistic clues suggest the page was generated with AI assistance, and the form was never connected to send data anywhere. The scam typically progresses to phone calls pressuring victims to install remote access software, and AI substantially lowers the barrier for producing polished, localized scam pages at scale.
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Mole Ransomware: How One Malicious Spam Campaign Quickly Increased Complexity and Changed Tactics
Unit 42 tracks the new Mole ransomware (CryptoMix family) spread via USPS-themed malspam, with tactics escalating to JavaScript downloaders dropping multiple malware families.
On April 11, 2017, a malspam campaign began distributing Mole ransomware, a CryptoMix-family strain, through USPS-themed emails linking to fake Microsoft Word Online sites offering a bogus Office plugin. By April 13 the campaign added Nemucod JavaScript downloaders installing Mole alongside Kovter and Miuref, and by April 18 it switched to the KINS banking Trojan before moving to speeding-ticket themes and a fake parking services website. Unit 42 notes the rapid tactic changes are likely intended to evade detection, and CryptoMix variants like Mole are typically repackaged within weeks.
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