Threat Actors Muddy Waters in Middle East with APT Hijacks and Fake Leaks in Q2 2019

According to Kaspersky’s quarterly APT trends summary, advanced persistent threat (APT) activity in Q2 2019 included a number of attacks targeting or originating in the Middle East and South Korea. While the goal for many of these threats was focused on cyberespionage or financial gain, one campaign trend varied from the rest with the purpose of spreading misinformation.

Kaspersky’s APT trends summary is compiled using information from various resources including Kaspersky’s private threat intelligence research to highlight the main developments that researchers believe the public should be aware of. In the second half of 2019, Kaspersky researchers observed interesting activity in the Middle East including a series of online asset leaks such as code, infrastructure, group and apparent victim details, allegedly belonging to known Persian-speaking threat actors, OilRig and MuddyWater. Though these leaks originated from different sources, they all appeared within a few weeks of each other. The third online leak, which was said to expose information related to an entity called the “RANA institute,” was published in Persian on a website called “Hidden Reality.”

Kaspersky researchers’ analysis of the materials, infrastructure and the dedicated website led to the conclusion that this particular leak could be connected to the threat actor, Hades. Hades is the well-known cyber threat group behind the OlympicDestroyer incident targeting the 2018 Winter Olympic Games, as well as the ExPetr worm and other various disinformation campaigns including the 2017 leak of emails relating to Emmanuel Macron’s presidential election campaign in France.

Additional APT highlights in Q2 2019 include:

• Russian-speaking groups continue to consistently refine and release new tools and launch new operations. Since March, Zebrocy appears to have turned its attention towards events, officials and related diplomats and military in Pakistan and India as well as maintaining ongoing access to local and remote Central Asian government networks. Turla’s attacks continue to feature a rapidly evolving toolset such as the apparent hijacking of infrastructure belonging to OilRig.
• Korean-related activity remained high while the rest of South East Asia saw less activity than in previous quarters. Notable operations include an attack by the Lazarus group targeting a mobile gaming company in South Korea and a campaign by BlueNoroff, a Lazarus sub-group, targeting a bank located in Bangladesh and crypto-currency software.
• Researchers also observed an active campaign targeting government bodies in Central Asia by Chinese-speaking APT group SixLittleMonkeys using a new version of the Microcin Trojan and a RAT that Kaspersky calls HawkEye as a last stager. 

“The second quarter of 2019 shows just how clouded and confusing the threat landscape has become, and how often something is not what it seems,” said Vicente Diaz, principal security researcher, Global Research and Analysis Team, Kaspersky. “We saw a threat actor hijacking the infrastructure of a smaller group and another group possibly capitalizing on a series of online leaks to spread disinformation and undermine the credibility of exposed assets. The security industry faces an ever-growing task to cut through the smoke and mirrors to find the facts and threat intelligence that cybersecurity relies on. As always, it is important to add that that our visibility is not complete, and there will be activity that is not yet on our radar or not fully understood, so protection against both known and unknown threats remains vital for everyone.”

The APT trends report for Q2 summarizes the findings of Kaspersky’s subscriber-only threat intelligence reports, which also includes Indicators of Compromise (IOC) data and YARA rules to assist in forensics and malware-hunting. For more information, please contact: [email protected]

Read the full APT Q2 2019 trends report on Securelist.

About Kaspersky

Kaspersky is a global cybersecurity company founded in 1997. Kaspersky’s deep threat intelligence and security expertise is constantly transforming into innovative security solutions and services to protect businesses, critical infrastructure, governments and consumers around the globe. The company’s comprehensive security portfolio includes leading endpoint protection and a number of specialized security solutions and services to fight sophisticated and evolving digital threats. Over 400 million users are protected by Kaspersky technologies and we help 270,000 corporate clients protect what matters most to them. Learn more at usa.kaspersky.com.