Middle East: Cyberwar Heats Up
Two new malware campaigns have been spotted in the Middle East, according to reports released this week. One targeting energy companies and the other was going after political targets in Israel and Lebanon.
Symantec researchers observed a brand-new information-gathering tool, Trojan. Laziok, this January and February, targeting primarily oil, gas and helium companies in the Middle East. The United Arab Emirates saw 25 percent of the infections, with other Middle East countries adding up to 30 percent more. Pakistan had 10 percent, and the US and the UK had another 10 percent between them.
According to Symantec senior security response manager Satnam Narang, the infection begins with a phishing email that contains an infected attachment, typically, an Excel file. The attachment uses a known ActiveX exploit to get in, an exploit that has been patched in 2012.
According to Philip Lieberman, president at Los Angeles-based security vendor Lieberman Software Corp., the recent drop in oil prices has led to a decrease in IT security investment in the oil and gas industry.
"This attack exploits an apparently well-known lack of investment by the oil and gas industry in keeping their Microsoft Office software up to date," said Lieberman and he also said that his company has seen this first-hand.
The exploit code in the attachment then installs the Trojan.Laziok, which collects information about the computer and sends it back to the attackers. That includes information about what kind of anti-virus is present. Tools that enable malware to evade antivirus detection are easily available, confirmed Joe Barrett, senior security consultant at Lake Mary, Fla.-based Foreground Security. "It means that defense in-depth and the principle of 'least privileged' are more important than ever."
Network defenders should watch for malicious traffic and be ready to isolate machines suspected of being infected.
This malware can monitor audio by turning on the audio on the computer, or capture video using the webcam. It can also log keystrokes and install additional malware.
According to researchers at Check Point Software Technologies, who released the Volatile Cedar report this week, that campaign dates all the way back to 2012. It also uses a new, custom information-gathering Trojan, which Check Point named Explosive. But while the Trojan.Laziok attack started with phishing emails, the Volatile Cedar attack began with publicly-facing web servers.
In addition, Check Point traced back the source of the Volatile Cedar attack to actors in Lebanon, and their targets were narrowly targeted political organizations in Israel and Lebanon. The targeting of organizations in Lebanon could be related to espionage among rival political groups, researchers said.
One possible indication that the Trojan.Laziok is not politically motivated is that the malware, which is also known as the Kraken Remote Access Trojan, has been spotted stealing Bitcoin wallets.
"It is unknown who is actually behind the attacks using Kraken," said Jeremy Scott, senior research analyst at Omaha-based security firm Solutionary, Inc. "However... Kraken is far from an 'espionage' malware unless the attackers behind it are more sophisticated than researchers are aware of."
