The RIG exploit kit (EK) touched an all-time substantial productive exploitation amount of approximately 30% in 2022, new conclusions expose.
“RIG EK is a fiscally-enthusiastic application that has been active considering the fact that 2014,” Swiss cybersecurity corporation PRODAFT explained in an exhaustive report shared with The Hacker Information.
“Although it has yet to considerably improve its exploits in its a lot more the latest exercise, the sort and model of the malware they distribute continually improve. The frequency of updating samples ranges from weekly to every day updates.”
Exploit kits are plans utilized to distribute malware to massive numbers of victims by using edge of regarded security flaws in usually-made use of computer software these as web browsers.
The actuality that RIG EK runs as a service design signifies threat actors can fiscally compensate the RIG EK administrator for putting in malware of their option on sufferer machines. The RIG EK operators largely use malvertising to ensure a higher infection fee and significant-scale protection.
As a final result, visitors employing a susceptible model of a browser to obtain an actor-managed web website page or a compromised-but-genuine internet site are redirected employing malicious JavaScript code to a proxy server, which, in switch, communicates with an exploit server to produce the suitable browser exploit.
The exploit server, for its portion, detects the user’s browser by parsing the Consumer-Agent string and returns the exploit that “matches the pre-described vulnerable browser versions.”
“The suave design of the Exploit Package permits it to infect units with minor to no conversation from the close person,” the scientists explained. “Meanwhile, its use of proxy servers helps make infections more difficult to detect.”
Due to the fact arriving on the scene in 2014, RIG EK has been observed delivering a huge selection of monetary trojans, stealers, and ransomware these types of as AZORult, CryptoBit, Dridex, Raccoon Stealer, and WastedLoader. The operation was dealt a enormous blow in 2017 next a coordinated motion that dismantled its infrastructure.
New RIG EK campaigns have specific a memory corruption vulnerability impacting Internet Explorer (CVE-2021-26411, CVSS rating: 8.8) to deploy RedLine Stealer.
Other browser flaws weaponized by the malware include CVE-2013-2551, CVE-2014-6332, CVE-2015-0313, CVE-2015-2419, CVE-2016-0189, CVE-2018-8174, CVE-2019-0752, and CVE-2020-0674.
According to facts collected by PRODAFT, 45% of the successful bacterial infections in 2022 leveraged CVE-2021-26411, followed by CVE-2016-0189 (29%), CVE-2019-0752 (10%), CVE-2018-8174 (9%), and CVE-2020-0674 (6%).
In addition to Dridex, Raccoon, and RedLine Stealer, some of the notable malware families dispersed applying RIG EK are SmokeLoader, PureCrypter, IcedID, ZLoader, TrueBot, Ursnif, and Royal ransomware.
Also, the exploit kit is mentioned to have attracted visitors from 207 nations around the world, reporting a 22% achievements level in excess of the past two months by itself. The most selection of compromises are positioned in Russia, Egypt, Mexico, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and a number of nations across Europe.
“Curiously sufficient, the exploit test charges were being the highest on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday – with successful infections getting place on the identical days of the week,” the scientists discussed.
PRODAFT, which also managed to acquire visibility into the kit’s regulate panel, explained there are about six various end users, two of whom (admin and vipr) have admin privileges. A user profile with the alias “pit” or “pitty” has subadmin permissions, and three many others (lyr, ump, and take a look at1) have consumer privileges.
“admin” is also a dummy user primarily reserved for producing other customers. The management panel, which will work with a subscription, is managed applying the “pitty” user.
Nevertheless, an operational security blunder that uncovered the git server led PRODAFT to de-anonymize two of the menace actors: a 31-calendar year-aged Uzbekistan national named Oleg Lukyanov and a Russian who goes by the identify Vladimir Nikonov.
It also assessed with superior self-confidence that the developer of the Dridex malware has a “near romance” with the RIG EK’s administrators, owing to the additional handbook
configuration measures taken to “make certain that the malware was distributed effortlessly.”
“Over-all, RIG EK runs a extremely fruitful company of exploit-as-a-provider, with victims across the globe, a very powerful exploit arsenal and various buyers with regularly updating malware,” the researchers reported.
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