Posts Tagged: microsoft

A Little Sunshine / Pharma Wars — 13 Comments
15
Jan 13

Spam Volumes: Past & Present, Global & Local

Last week, National Public Radio aired a story on my Pharma Wars series, which chronicles an epic battle between men who ran two competing cybercrime empires that used spam to pimp online pharmacy sites. As I was working with the NPR reporter on the story, I was struck by how much spam has decreased over the past couple of years.

Below is a graphic that’s based on spam data collected by Symantec‘s MessageLabs. It shows that global spam volumes fell and spiked fairly regularly, from highs of 6 trillion messages sent per month to just below 1 trillion. I produced this graph based on Symantec’s raw spam data.

gsv07-12

Some of the points on the graph where spam volumes fall precipitously roughly coincide with major disruptive events, such as the disconnection of rogue ISPs McColo Corp. and 3FN, as well as targeted takedowns against major spam botnets, including Bredolab, Rustock and Grum. Obviously, this graph shows a correlation to those events, not a direct causation; there may well have been other events other than those mentioned that caused decreases in junk email volumes worldwide. Nevertheless, it is clear that the closure of the SpamIt affiliate program in the fall of 2010 marked the beginning of a steep and steady decline of spam volumes that persists to this day.

Of course, spam volumes are relative, depending on where you live and which providers you rely on for email and connections to the larger Internet. As I was putting together these charts, I also asked for spam data from Cloudmark, a San Francisco-based email security firm. Their data (shown in the graphs below) paint a very interesting picture of the difference in percentage of email that is spam coming from users of the top three email services: The spam percentages were Yahoo! (22%), Microsoft (11%) and  Google (6%).

WebMailSpamCloudmark

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Time to Patch — 5 Comments
14
Jan 13

Microsoft Issues Fix for Zero-Day IE Flaw

Microsoft today deviated from its usual monthly patch cycle in issuing an emergency security update to fix a critical security hole in its Internet Explorer Web browser that attackers have been exploiting to break into Windows PCs.

IEwarningThe update, MS13-008, addresses a single vulnerability in IE versions 6 through 8, and is available through Windows Update. The patch comes a little more than two weeks after security firms began seeing evidence that hackers were leveraging the vulnerability in targeted attacks. Microsoft maintains that it has seen only a limited number of attacks against the flaw, but acknowledged in a blog post that “the potential exists that more customers could be affected.”

Prior to today, Microsoft released a stopgap Fix It tool to help blunt attacks against the IE flaw. According to Microsoft, “if you previously applied the Fix it offered through the advisory, you do not need to uninstall it before applying the security update released today. However, the Fix it is no longer needed after the security update is installed, so we are recommending that you uninstall it after you have applied the update to your system.” Users who applied the Fix It solution can uninstall it by clicking the Fix It icon under the words “Disable MSHTML shim workaround” at this page.

A Little Sunshine — 24 Comments
10
Jan 13

Police Arrest Alleged ZeuS Botmaster “bx1″

A man arrested in Thailand this week on charges of stealing millions from online bank accounts fits the profile of a miscreant nicknamed “bx1,” a hacker fingered by Microsoft as a major operator of botnets powered by the ZeuS banking trojan.

Photo: Bangkok Post

Photo: Bangkok Post

As reported by The Bangkok Post, 24-year-old Hamza Bendelladj, an Algerian national, was detained this weekend at Bangkok’s Suvarnnabhumi airport, as he was in transit from Malaysia to Egypt. This young man captured news media attention when he was brought out in front of Thai television cameras handcuffed but smiling broadly, despite being blamed by the FBI for hacking into customer accounts at 217 financial institutions worldwide.

Thai investigators told reporters that Bendelladj had amassed “huge amounts” in illicit earnings, and that “with just one transaction he could earn 10 to 20 million dollars. He’s been travelling the world flying first class and living a life of luxury.”

I didn’t fully appreciate why I found this case so interesting until I started searching the Internet and my own servers for his email address. Turns out that in 2011, I was contacted via instant message by a hacker who said he was operating botnets using the Zeus and SpyEye Trojans. This individual reached out to me repeatedly over the next year, for no apparent reason except to brag about his exploits. He contacted me via Microsoft’s MSN instant message platform, using the email address daniel.h.b@universityofsutton.com. That account used the alias “Daniel.” I later found out that Daniel also used the nickname bx1.

According to several forums on which bx1 hung out until very recently, the man arrested in Thailand and bx1 were one and the same. A review of the email addresses and other contact information bx1 shared on these forums suggests that bx1 was the 19th and 20th John Doe named in Microsoft’s 2012 legal suit seeking to discover the identities of 39 alleged ZeuS botmasters. From the complaint Microsoft submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, and posted at Zeuslegalnotice.com:

msjohndoes“Plaintiffs are informed and believe and thereupon allege that John Doe 19/20 goes by the aliases “Daniel,” “bx1,” “Daniel Hamza” and “Danielbx1” and may be contacted at messaging email and messaging addresses “565359703,” airlord1988@gmail.com, bx1@hotmail.com, i_amhere@hotmail.fr, daniel.h.b@universityof sutton.com, princedelune@hotmail.fr, bx1_@msn.com, danibx1@hotmail.fr, and danieldelcore@hotmail.com. Upon information and belief, John Doe 19/20 has purchased and used the Zeus/SpyEye code.”

The Daniel I chatted with was proud of his work, and seemed to enjoy describing successful attacks. In one such conversation, dated January 2012, bx1 bragged about breaking into the systems of a hacker who used the nickname “Symlink” and was renowned in the underground for writing complex, custom Web injects for ZeuS and SpyEye users. Specifically, Symlink’s code was designed to automate money transfers out of victim banks to accounts that ZeuS and SpyEye botmasters controlled. Here’s an excerpt from that chat:

(12:31:22 AM) Daniel: if you wanna write up a story

(12:31:34 AM) Daniel: a very perfect

(12:31:34 AM) Daniel: even Interpol will get to you

(12:31:35 AM)  Brian Krebs: ?

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Latest Warnings / Other / Time to Patch — 29 Comments
8
Jan 13

Adobe, Microsoft Ship Critical Security Updates

Adobe and Microsoft today separately issued updates to fix critical security vulnerabilities in their products. Adobe pushed out fixes for security issues in Acrobat, Adobe Reader and its Flash Player plugin. Microsoft released seven patches addressing at least a dozen security holes in Windows and other software, although it failed to issue an official patch for a dangerous flaw in its Internet Explorer Web browser that attackers are now actively exploiting.

Two of the patches that Microsoft issued today earned a “critical” rating, signifying that these vulnerabilities could be exploited to fully compromise vulnerable Windows systems without any help from users. Microsoft called special attention to two critical bugs in its XML Core Services component; the company said it is likely that malware or miscreants will figure out a way to exploit these flaws in active attacks sometime within the next 30 days.

Unfortunately, Microsoft did not offer an official fix for a critical Windows flaw that malware and miscreants are already exploiting. In late December, Microsoft acknowledged that attackers were using a previously undocumented security hole in Internet Explorer versions 6 through 8 to break into Windows PCs. Microsoft later issued a stopgap “FixIt” tool to help lessen the vulnerability on affected systems, but researchers last week demonstrated that the FixIt tool only blocked some methods of attacking the flaw, leaving other ways unguarded. Meanwhile, a working copy of the exploit has been folded into Metasploit, a free penetration testing tool.

Wolfgang Kandek, chief technology officer at vulnerability management firm Qualys, said the zero-day IE vulnerability affects 90% of the IE install base at this time.

“Microsoft is not providing a patch today, though they have provided a Fix-It for the issue,” Kandek wrote in a blog post. “The vulnerability should be tracked closely, as a large percentage of enterprises still run the affected versions.”

Users who wish to continue browsing the Web with IE should upgrade to IE9 if possible (IE10 on Windows 8 also is not vulnerable). Users still on Windows XP will not be able to update to IE9, but may be able to derive some protection from the FixIt tool and by using Microsoft’s EMET tool. XP users may be better off, however, browsing with Firefox or Chrome with some type of script blocking and/or sandbox in place. More information on how to use EMET and script blocking options is available in my Tools for a Safer PC primer. More details about today’s updates from Microsoft can be found at the Microsoft Security Response Center blog and in the security bulletin summaries for each patch.

The Adobe Flash patch fixes at least one critical vulnerability in the media player plugin. Updates are available for all supported versions of Flash, including for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android. See the chart below for the latest version number broken down by operating system.

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Latest Warnings — 31 Comments
3
Jan 13

Turkish Registrar Enabled Phishers to Spoof Google

Google and Microsoft today began warning users about active phishing attacks against Google’s online properties. The two companies said the attacks resulted from a fraudulent digital certificate that was mistakenly issued by a Turkish domain registrar.

In a blog post published today, Google said that on Dec. 24, 2012, its Chrome Web browser detected and blocked an unauthorized digital certificate for the “*.google.com” domain.

“We investigated immediately and found the certificate was issued by an intermediate certificate authority (CA) linking back to TURKTRUST, a Turkish certificate authority,” wrote Adam Langley, a Google software engineer. “Intermediate CA certificates carry the full authority of the CA, so anyone who has one can use it to create a certificate for any website they wish to impersonate.”

Langley said that Google responded by Chrome on December 25 to block that intermediate CA, and then alerted TURKTRUST and other browser vendors. “TURKTRUST told us that based on our information, they discovered that in August 2011 they had mistakenly issued two intermediate CA certificates to organizations that should have instead received regular SSL certificates. On December 26, we pushed another Chrome metadata update to block the second mistaken CA certificate and informed the other browser vendors.”

Separately, Microsoft has issued an advisory with a bit more detail, saying it is aware of active attacks using one of the fraudulent digital certificates issued by TURKTRUST Inc.

“This fraudulent certificate could be used to spoof content, perform phishing attacks, or perform man-in-the-middle attacks. This issue affects all supported releases of Microsoft Windows,” the software giant warned. Continue reading →

Latest Warnings — 46 Comments
28
Dec 12

Attackers Target Internet Explorer Zero-Day Flaw

Attackers are breaking into Microsoft Windows computers using a newly discovered vulnerability in Internet Explorer, security experts warn. While the flaw appears to have been used mainly in targeted attacks so far, this vulnerability could become more widely exploited if incorporated into commercial crimeware kits sold in the underground.

IEwarningIn a blog posting Friday evening, Milpitas, Calif. based security vendor FireEye said it found that the Web site for the Council on Foreign Relations was compromised and rigged to exploit a previously undocumented flaw in IE8 to install malicious software on vulnerable PCs used to browse the site.

According to FireEye, the attack uses Adobe Flash to exploit a vulnerability in the latest (fully-patched) version of IE8. Dustin Childs, group manager for response communications at Microsoft, said the vulnerability appears to exist in previous versions of IE.

“We are actively investigating reports of a small, targeted issue affecting Internet Explorer 6-8,” Childs said in an emailed statement. “We will take appropriate action to help keep customers protected once our analysis is complete. People using Internet Explorer 9-10 are not impacted.”

As FireEye notes, this is another example of a “watering hole” attack, which involves the targeted compromise of legitimate websites thought to be of interest to or frequented by end users who belong to organizations that attackers wish to infiltrate. Earlier this year, I wrote about similar zero-day attacks against visitors to the Web sites of the National Democratic Institute, The Carter Center, and Radio Free Europe.

Update, Dec. 30, 9:25 a.m. ET: Microsoft has officially acknowledged this vulnerability in an advisory, which contains some advice for IE users about how to mitigate the threat. As IE versions 9 and 10 are not impacted, users running Windows Vista or higher can upgrade to the latest browser version here.

Update, Jan.1 8:56 p.m. ET: Microsoft’s advisory now includes a link to a stopgap “FixIt” solution that may help to blunt attacks until the company issues an official patch for this vulnerability.

Latest Warnings / Security Tools / Time to Patch — 26 Comments
11
Dec 12

Critical Updates for Flash Player, Microsoft Windows

Adobe and Microsoft have each released security updates to fix critical security flaws in their software. Microsoft issued seven update bundles to fix at least 10 vulnerabilities in Windows and other software. Separately, Adobe pushed out a fix for its Flash Player and AIR software that address at least three critical vulnerabilities in these programs.

A majority of the bugs quashed in Microsoft’s patch batch are critical security holes, meaning that malware or miscreants could exploit them to seize control over vulnerable systems with little or no help from users. Among the critical patches is an update for Internet Explorer versions 9 and 10 (Redmond says these flaws are not present in earlier versions of IE).

Other critical patches address issues with the Windows kernel, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft Exchange Server. The final critical bug is a file handling vulnerability in Windows XP, Vista and 7 that Microsoft said could allow remote code execution if a user browses to a folder that contains a file or subfolder with a specially crafted name. Yikes. Updates are available through Windows Update or via Automatic Updates.

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A Little Sunshine / Pharma Wars — 14 Comments
11
Dec 12

A Closer Look at Two Bigtime Botmasters

Over the past 18 months, I’ve published a series of posts that provide clues about the possible real-life identities of the men responsible for building some of the largest and most disruptive spam botnets on the planet. I’ve since done a bit more digging into the backgrounds of the individuals thought to be responsible for the Rustock and Waledac spam botnets, which has produced some additional fascinating and corroborating details about these two characters.

In March 2011, KrebsOnSecurity featured never-before-published details about the financial accounts and nicknames used by the Rustock botmaster. That story was based on information leaked from SpamIt, a cybercrime business that paid spammers to promote rogue Internet pharmacies (think Viagra spam). In a follow-up post, I wrote that the Rustock botmaster’s personal email account was tied to a domain name ger-mes.ru, which at one time featured a résumé of a young man named Dmitri A. Sergeev.

Then, on Jan. 26. 2012, I ran a story featuring a trail of evidence suggesting a possible identity of “Severa“ (a.k.a. “Peter Severa”), another SpamIt affiliate who is widely considered the author of the Waledac botnet (and likely the Storm Worm). In that story, I included several screen shots of Severa chatting on Spamdot.biz, an extremely secretive Russian forum dedicated to those involved in the spam business. In one of the screen shots, Severa laments the arrest of Alan Ralsky, a convicted American spam kingpin who specialized in stock spam and who — according to the U.S. Justice Department – was partnered with Severa. Anti-spam activists at Spamhaus.org maintain that Peter Severa’s real name is Peter Levashov (although the evidence I gathered also turned up another name, Viktor Sergeevich Ivashov).

It looks now like Spamhaus’s conclusion on Severa was closer to the truth. More on that in a second. I was able to feature the Spamdot discussions because I’d obtained a backup copy of the forum. But somehow in all of my earlier investigations I overlooked a handful of private messages between Severa and the Rustock botmaster, who used the nickname “Tarelka” on Spamdot. Apparently, the two worked together on the same kind of pump-and-dump stock spam schemes, but also knew each other intimately enough to be on a first-name basis.

Spamdot.biz chat between Tarelka and Severa

The following is from a series of private Spamdot message exchanged between Tarelka and Severa on May 25 and May 26, 2010. In it, Severa refers to Tarelka as “Dimas,” a familiar form of “Dmitri.” Likewise, Tarelka addresses Severa as “Petka,” a common Russian diminutive of “Peter.” They discuss a mysterious mutual friend named John, who apparently used the nickname “Apple.”

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Other / Security Tools / Time to Patch — 28 Comments
13
Nov 12

Microsoft Patches 19 Security Holes

Microsoft today issued six software updates to fix at least 19 security holes in Windows and other Microsoft products. Thirteen of those vulnerabilities earned a “critical” rating, which means miscreants or malicious code could leverage them to break into vulnerable systems without any help from users.

Of note in these patches is a critical update for Internet Explorer 9 that fixes three flaws in IE (these bugs do not exist in older versions of IE, according to Microsoft). Other critical updates address extremely dangerous flaws in core Windows components, such as the Windows shell and Windows Kernel; these vulnerabilities are present in nearly all supported versions of Windows.

All of the critical updates earned the most dire marks on Microsoft’s “exploitability index,” which tries assess the likelihood that attackers will devise remote code execution attacks and denial of service exploits within 30 days of a security bulletin release.

Also included among the critical patches is an update for Microsoft’s .NET Framework. I mention this one separately because in the few times I’ve had troubles after applying Windows security updates, a .NET Framework patch has always been part of the mix. My update this time around went fine (albeit a tad slowly) on a Windows 7 system, but if you experience any issues applying these patches, please leave a note in the comments section below.

Other vulnerabilities addressed in today’s update batch include flaws in Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS). A summary of the bulletins released today is available at this link. Wolfgang Kandek, chief technology officer at Qualys, has put together a readable blog post with some additional thoughts on the severity and relative urgency of today’s patches.

Update, 8:34 p.m.. ET: Several readers have pointed my attention to problems with a non-security update released with today’s batch: KB2750841. According to this thread, KB2750841 seems to be causing issues for users of OpenDNS. This workaround from OpenDNS forum user “gotroot” appears to have worked for most users experiencing problems.

A Little Sunshine / The Coming Storm — 16 Comments
12
Nov 12

Malware Spy Network Targeted Israelis, Palestinians

Researchers in Norway have uncovered evidence of a vast Middle Eastern espionage network that for the past year has deployed malicious software to spy on Israeli and Palestinian targets.

The discovery, by Oslo-based antivirus and security firm Norman ASA, is the latest in a series of revelations involving digital surveillance activity of unknown origin that appears designed to gather intelligence from specific targets in the Middle East.

Norman’s experts say the true extent of the spy network came into focus after news of a cyber attack in late October 2012 that caused Israeli authorities to shut down Internet access for its police force. According to press reports, that incursion was spearheaded by a booby-trapped email that was made to look as if it was sent by Benny Gantz, the chief of general staff of the Israel Defense Forces.

Security vendor Trend Micro suggested that the initial target of that attack were systems within the Israeli Customs agency, and said the malware deployed was a version of Xtreme RAT, a Remote Access Trojan that can be used to steal information and receive commands from a remote attacker. According to Trend, the latest iterations of Xtreme Rat have Windows 8 compatibility, improved Chrome and Firefox password grabbing, and improved audio and desktop capture capabilities features.

All of the malware files Fagerland discovered as part of this campaign were signed with this phony Microsoft certificate.

Snorre Fagerland, a senior virus researcher at Norman, said he examined a sample of the Trojan used to deploy the malware in that attack, and found that it included a rather telltale trait: It was signed with a digital certificate that was spoofed to appear as though it had been digitally signed by Microsoft.

The faked digital certificate would not stand up to validation by Windows– or anyone who cared to verify it with the trusted root certificates shipped with Windows PCs. But it proved to be a convenient marker for Fagerland, who’s been scouring malware databases for other samples that used the same phony certificate ever since. So far, he’s mapped out an expanding network of malware and control servers that have been used in dozens of targeted email attacks (see graphic below).

“These malwares are set up to use the same framework, talk to same control servers, and have same spoofed digital certificate,” Fagerland said in an interview with KrebsOnSecurity. “In my view, they are same attackers.”

Fagerland discovered a vast network of command and control servers (yellow) that all bore the same forged Microsoft certificate and powered malware that targeted Israeli and Palestinian users.

Fagerland found that the oldest of the malicious files bearing the forged Microsoft certificate were created back in October 2011, and that the Arabic language email lures used in tandem with those samples highlighted Palestinian news issues. He observed that the attackers used dynamic DNS providers to periodically shift the Internet addresses of their control networks, but that those addresses nearly always traced back to networks in Gaza assigned to a hosting provider in Ramallah in the West Bank.

After about eight months of this activity, the focus of the malware operation pivoted to attacking Israeli targets, Fagerland discovered. When that happened, the attackers shifted the location of their control servers to networks in the United States.

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