Politically Motivated Cyberattackers Adopting New Tactics, Report Says

[Williamj]

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Organized and politically motivated cyberattackers are changing their methods, finding new, less direct methods of launching targeted attacks on enterprises and government agencies, according to a report issued today.
The report, issued today by threat intelligence company CrowdStrike, offers a detailed look at the motivations, methods, and practices of five organized cyberattack groups -- including the Syrian Electronic Army as well as groups in China, Iran, and Russia -- during 2013.


The methods of these politically motivated groups are changing, according to the report. While targeted attacks historically have begun with phishing attacks directly on members of the targeted organization, more sophisticated groups are now using more indirect methods -- attacking third parties and collecting information from targeted users by infecting their favorite websites.
Using specific examples from recent attacks, the CrowdStrike report illustrates recent shifts in attacker strategy, such as the trend toward making targeted attacks by infiltrating a trusted third party. The report outlines details of exploits by the SEA -- a group that CrowdStrike calls Deadeye Jackal -- in which critical user data was extracted through the breach of third-party communications platforms and applications, such as Truecaller, TangoME, and Viber Media.


"Expect to see adversaries targeting third-party vendors [in 2014] in an attempt to compromise the ultimate target," the report states. "Third-party vendors often have less-robust security than their larger customers, and their networks offer an avenue through which those customers can be compromised."
Similarly, many organized cybergroups have changed their methods for tricking users into downloading malware, CrowdStrike says. While many attackers traditionally have sought to infect the user through by sending a fake email -- sometimes called a phishing attack -- some organized groups are now using strategic Web compromises (SWC), the company reports.
SWCs -- sometimes called "watering holes" -- are legitimate websites that have been infected by an attacker in order to steal the personal data of those who frequent the site. For example, an attacker looking to collect data on political officials might infect the site of a conference or event that is attended by those officials.
"Where these groups used a lot of spearphishing in the past, we have seen many more SWCs in the last year," says Dmitri Alperovitch, co-founder and CTO of CrowdStrike. SWCs are harder to detect and remediate than phishing attacks, and it's harder to identify who launched them, he notes.



SWCs played key roles in recent attacks by organized Chinese hacker groups on the U.S. Department of Labor and the Council on Foreign Relations, the CrowdStrike report says.
Organized attackers often find that an indirect route to a target is easier than a direct attack, according to CrowdStrike. A China-based group that CrowdStrike has dubbed Emissary Panda is focusing much of its attention on compromising the systems of foreign embassies, rather than going after government systems in their home country. Similarly, a China-based group that CrowdStrike calls Numbered Panda has been conducting spearphishing attacks under the guise of the G20 Summit, an event that attracts top government officials from most of the world's top industrialized nations.
"Targeted intrusion operators like to leverage major events in their operations," the report states. In 2014, organized groups will likely build phishing attacks and SWCs around events such as the Winter Olympics, the World Cup, the G20 Summit, and upcoming national elections in Egypt, Iraq, Tunisia, and Turkey, CrowdStrike warns.
One group that targeted national elections in 2013 was an organized cel in Iran that CrowdStrike calls Magic Kitten. The group attempted to affect the outcome of Iran's elections through a series of attacks targeting political dissidents and those supporting Iranian political opposition, according to the report. The group’s preferred attack vector is spearphishing, accompanied by malicious Word documents and image files, which enabled the attackers to retrieve information about victims' computers, do keylogging, file execution, voice recording, and file exfiltration.
CrowdStrike, which is currently monitoring more than 50 groups of cyberattackers in countries all over the world, predicts that such politically motivated groups will continue to evolve their tactics to avoid detection and take advantage of vulnerabilities in new technologies, such as the emerging generic top-level domains (gTLDs) that are scheduled to go into operation this year.

[shaggie]

kuyaw ning mga chinese karon dah elisan tag noodles ani

[sophieh]

filipino must have a security skills and training

[rasti]

likes ko ani

[trying]

Mga filipinos dapat mo upgrade na gyud ta sa technology especially sa security ky kuwang kaayo ta ug awareness about security

[Williamj]

china the biggest treat solutions is awareness

[MarieKris]

That's why drone was deployed already in china and nkorea

[anggwaponi]

--- updating ---





NTC website hacked over slow PH internet speed
NOTE: News link courtesy of interaksyon.com

[salbahis]

security, pfft... what a joke... as long as the machine is on it can be hacked.... how much more connected sa net... the weakest link on all security protocol are the user's stupidity... which is daghan kay raba ani sa pilipinas...

[anggwaponi]

--- updating ---





To fight cyberattacks, Aquino creates cybersecurity committee
NOTE: News link courtesy of Inquirer.net