Auteur Sujet: [FireEye]New SUNSHUTTLE Second-Stage Backdoor Uncovered Targeting U.S.-Based Entity; Possible Connection to UNC2452 (Lu 3106 fois)

igor51 · « **le:** mars 05, 2021, 04:01:06 »

New SUNSHUTTLE Second-Stage Backdoor Uncovered Targeting U.S.-Based
Entity; Possible Connection to UNC2452

Executive Summary

In August 2020, a U.S.-based entity uploaded a new backdoor
that we have named SUNSHUTTLE to a public malware repository.

SUNSHUTTLE is a second-stage backdoor written in GoLang that
features some detection evasion capabilities.
Mandiant
observed SUNSHUTTLE at a victim compromised by UNC2452, and have
indications that it is linked to UNC2452, but we have not fully
verified this connection.
Please see the Technical Annex
for relevant MITRE ATT&CK techniques (T1027, T1027.002,
T1059.003, T1071.001, T1105, T1140, T1573.001).

The activity discussed in this blog post is also detailed in a href="https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/04/goldmax-goldfinder-sibot-analyzing-nobelium-malware/">Microsoft
blog post. We thank the team at Microsoft and other partners
for their great collaboration in tracking this actor.

Threat Detail

Mandiant Threat Intelligence discovered a new backdoor uploaded by a
U.S.-based entity to a public malware repository in August 2020 that
we have named SUNSHUTTLE. SUNSHUTTLE is written in GO, and reads an
embedded or local configuration file, communicates with a hard-coded
command and control (C2) server over HTTPS, and supports commands
including remotely uploading its configuration, file upload and
download, and arbitrary command execution. Notably, SUNSHUTTLE uses
cookie headers to pass values to the C2, and if configured, can select
referrers from a list of popular website URLs to help such network
traffic “blend in.”

The SUNSHUTTLE backdoor file examined, “Lexicon.exe” (MD5:
9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd), was written in GoLang. The file
unpacks into MD5: 86e89349fefcbdd9d2c80ca30fa85511.
The
infection vector for SUNSHUTTLE is not known. It is most likely a
second-stage backdoor dropped after an initial compromise.

The SUNSHUTTLE sample uses the actor-controlled server
“reyweb[.]com” for C2. “Reyweb[.]com” is registered anonymously via
NameSilo, a domain provider who accepts bitcoin payment and has been
used for C2 registration by state-sponsored APTs in the past,
including Russia-nexus actors and Iran-nexus APTs

Mandiant observed SUNSHUTTLE at a victim compromised by UNC2452, and
have indications that it is linked to UNC2452, but we have not fully
verified this connection.

Please see FireEye’s resource center for href="https://www.fireeye.com/current-threats/sunburst-malware.html">background
on UNC2452 and the SUNBURST campaign.

Outlook and Implications

The new SUNSHUTTLE backdoor is a sophisticated second-stage backdoor
that demonstrates straightforward but elegant detection evasion
techniques via its “blend-in” traffic capabilities for C2
communications. SUNSHUTTLE would function as second-stage backdoor in
such a compromise for conducting network reconnaissance alongside
other SUNBURST-related tools.

Technical Annex

Mandiant Threat Intelligence discovered a sample of the SUNSHUTTLE
backdoor uploaded to an online multi-Antivirus scan service.
SUNSHUTTLE is a backdoor, written in GO, that reads an embedded or
local configuration file, communicates with its C2 server over HTTPS
and supports commands including remotely updating its configuration,
file upload and download, and arbitrary command execution.

Lexicon.exe (MD5: 9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd)
- C2: reyweb[.]com
- UNAVAILABLE (MD5:
  86e89349fefcbdd9d2c80ca30fa85511)
  - Unpacked version of
    9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd

Infection Vector

For the samples analyzed, the infection vector is not known.

Execution

Execution Summary

SUNSHUTTLE is a backdoor written in GoLang. Once SUNSHUTTLE is
executed, a high-level description of the execution is the following:

Configuration settings determined
Request a “session
key” from the C2
Retrieve the “session key” from the C2
- Once a session key is retrieved, SUNSHUTTLE begins command
  request beaconing loop
Begin command
request beaconing
Resolve command and perform action

The SUNSHUTTLE sample analyzed retains the names of the routines
used by the malware, which include the following:

main.request_session_key

main.define_internal_settings

main.send_file_part

main.clean_file

main.send_command_result

main.retrieve_session_key

main.save_internal_settings

main.resolve_command

main.write_file

main.beaconing

main.wget_file

main.fileExists

main.encrypt

main.decrypt

main.random

main.removeBase64Padding

main.addBase64Padding

main.delete_empty

main.Unpad

main.GetMD5Hash

main.Pad

Note: Throughout the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor, unique string
identifiers are used to indicate the operation being performed to the
C2 via a Cookie header, and unique string identifiers are also used to
validate and parse response content from the C2. These unique string
values are thought to be unique and random per compiled sample.

Initial Execution

Once executed, the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor enumerates the victim’s MAC
address and compares it to a hardcoded MAC address value
“c8:27:cc:c2:37:5a”. If a match is found the backdoor exits. The MAC
address is likely a default MAC address for the Windows sandbox
network adapter.

src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/blog/images/sunshuttle/fig1.png" alt="" />

Figure 1: Mac address check

Configuration

If the check is successful, the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor then enters a
routine named “main_define_internal_settings”, which handles creation
of the configuration file if one doesn’t already exist in the
directory from which SUNSHUTTLE is running. For the sample analyzed,
the configuration filename is “config.dat.tmp”. The configuration data
is Base64 encoded and AES-256 encrypted using the following key:

hz8l2fnpvp71ujfy8rht6b0smouvp9k8

The configuration has the following example values when Base64
decoded and AES decrypted:

class="code">48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67|5-15|0|0|TW96aWxsYS81LjAgKFdpbmRvd3MgTlQgMTAuMDsgV2luNjQ7IHg2NDsgcnY6NzUuMCkgR2V
ja28vMjAxMDAxMDEgRmlyZWZveC83NS4w

The configuration holds several values delimited by a “|” character,
which are briefly described as follows.

48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67
- MD5 hash of the
  current timestamp calculated during execution.

5-15
- Lower/upper limits used to randomly generate
  sleep times as SUNSHUTTLE executes
0
- 0 or 1 — Utilize “blend-in” traffic requests. Internally
  called “false_requesting”
0
- Activate execution timestamp (0 by default) — execution
  "activates" or continues if current time is greater
  than the value in the configuration

TW96aWxsYS81LjAgKFdpbmRvd3MgTlQgMTAuMDsgV2luNjQ7IHg2NDsgcnY6NzUuMCkgR2Vja2

8vMjAxMDAxMDEgRmlyZWZveC83NS4w
- Base64-encoded User-agent
  used in HTTPS requests
- Decoded: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT
  10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0

If set in the configuration, the “blend-in” traffic occurs as the
malware executes and transitions through its routines. The following
URLs are leveraged for the “blend-in” requests:

https://reyweb[.]com/icon.ico

https://reyweb[.]com/icon.png

https://reyweb[.]com/script.js

https://reyweb[.]com/style.css

https://reyweb[.]com/css/style.css

https://reyweb[.]com/css/bootstrap.css

https://reyweb[.]com/scripts/jquery.js

https://reyweb[.]com/scripts/bootstrap.js

https://cdn.mxpnl[.]com/
https://cdn.google[.]com/

https://cdn.jquery[.]com/
https://code.jquery[.]com/

https://cdn.cloudflare[.]com/

Session Key Mechanism

SUNSHUTTLE performs initial requests to the C2 in order to request
and then retrieve what it internally refers to as a session key. The
retrieved session key from the C2 appears to be RSA decrypted using
the following private key that is embedded in SUNSHUTTLE and believed
to be unique per compiled sample. Analysis is on-going on how the
decrypted session key is used, but it is likely a session key used to
encrypt content once SUNSHUTTLE transitions to its command-and-control routines.

After the configuration is created or read from, SUNSHUTTLE enters a
routine named “main_request_session_key”. The malware will iterate
over this routine until it’s successful, sleeping a period of time
after each iteration.

Inside the “main_request_session_key” routine, SUNSHUTTLE
constructs an HTTPS request to its configured C2. Upon an HTTP 200
response from the request, the response data from the C2 is expected
to not contain the following string for the sample analyzed:

ywQdjLuHHC

The request_session_key routine returns a 1 if the string is not in
the response and a -1 if it is in the response. If the result of the
request_session_key is 1, SUNSHUTTLE will execute the
retrieve_session_key routine.

The retrieve_session_key routine again contacts the C2 and downloads
content that is expected to be decrypted by the aforementioned
embedded private key. The decrypted content is likely a session key
used to encrypt content once SUNSHUTTLE transitions to its
command-and-control routines.

Commanding

Once a session key is retrieved from the C2, SUNSHUTTLE begins the
beaconing and “resolve_command” routines in a loop. SUNSHUTTLE first
issues a beacon to retrieve a command. After, SUNSHUTTLE will enter
the routine “resolve_command”, which parses the response content to
determine which command should be run. Available commands include
remotely updating its configuration, file upload and download, and
arbitrary command execution.

src="https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/blog/images/sunshuttle/fig2.png" alt="" />

Figure 2: Resolve command graph

The content returned from the C2 after the “main_beaconing” routine
is Base64 decoded and AES decrypted. A check is performed to ensure
the decrypted content doesn’t contain the following string:

Cp5RTQ31R1

As noted, it is likely these strings are unique per sample and
randomly generated at compilation.

The decrypted content is parsed for certain unique strings.

width="312" valign="top">

Meaning

width="312" valign="top">

Provides terminal command
execution

width="312" valign="top">

Download file from C2

Unique string in decrypted response
zSsP2TSJJm3a	valign="top"> Update sleep range — save config
aQJmWJzXdYK721mGBI3U	valign="top"> Update “false requesting” value – save config
W5VYP9Iu2uyHK	valign="top"> Update C2 URL and User-agent – save config
3487wD9t2OZkvqdwRpqPeE	valign="top"> Send current timestamp to C2
ubFxROBRwfswVRWNjLC	valign="top"> Update "activation" timestamp in the config — save config
TMuhGdA9EHY	valign="top"> Upload file to C2 if the file exists
1kG4NaRX83BCMgLo38Bjq	valign="top"> Execute command – return “EXECED” if successful
hB0upT6CUmdRaR2KVBvxrJ	valign="top"> Execute command – return results/output
N/A (other string criteria met)
N/A (other string criteria met)

Files Dropped

After successful execution of the malware, it drops the following
files to the victim’s system:

<current_directory>\config.dat.tmp (MD5: Dynamic)
- Encrypted configuration file

Persistence Method

The SUNSHUTTLE malware was not observed setting its own persistence.
It is likely the persistence is set outside of the execution of SUNSHUTTLE.

Network Communications

SUNSHUTTLE uses the cookie header to pass values to the C2.
Additionally, a referrer is selected from the following list,
presumably to make the traffic blend in if traffic is being decrypted
for inspection:

www.bing.com
www.yahoo.com

www.google.com
www.facebook.com

The cookie headers vary slightly depending on the operation being
performed. The following is an example request to the C2 from the
“request_session_key” routine.

Victim to C2
GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1

Host: reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Cookie:
HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI;
iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78

Referer: www.facebook.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Within the Cookie header, these values represent the following:

HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67
- Timestamp MD5 contained within the configuration
P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI
- “P5hCrabkKf=” contains a unique string based on which
  routine is performing the request (see the following
  table).
iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx
- “i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx” is hard coded within the
  SUNSHUTTLE backdoor. It possibly represents a payload
  identifier
b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78
- Unknown purpose. This value is only included in
  request_session_key and retrieve_session_key requests.

As mentioned, the cookie value “P5hCrabkKf=” contained in each
request signifies the operation that is being performed.

valign="top">

main_request_session_key

valign="top">

main_clean_file

valign="top">

main_wget_file

valign="top">

main_retrieve_session_key

valign="top">

main_send_file_part

valign="top">

main_send_command_result

“P5hCrabkKf=” Cookie Value	Meaning
gZLXIeK
do1KiqzhQ
t5UITQ2PdFg5
cIHiqD5p4da6OeB
xpjQVt3bJzWuv
S4rgG1WifHU

After successful installation / initialization of the malware, it
proceeds to make the following callback to the C2 server reyweb[.]com
via TCP/443 HTTPS:

Victim to C2
GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1

Host: reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Cookie:
HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI;
iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78

Referer: www.facebook.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Victim to C2
GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1

Host: reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Cookie:
HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI;
iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78

Referer: www.yahoo.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Additionally, if the “fake_requesting” configuration value is set to
1, SUNSHUTTLE will generate traffic meant to blend in with real
traffic. Examples of those requests are as follows:

Victim to C2
GET /icon.png HTTP/1.1
Host:
reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64;
x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Referer:
www.google.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Victim to C2
GET /css/style.css HTTP/1.1

Host: reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Referer:
www.facebook.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Victim to C2
GET /css/bootstrap.css HTTP/1.1

Host: reyweb[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Referer:
www.facebook.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Victim to Legitimate
GET / HTTP/1.1
Host:
cdn.cloudflare[.]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0;
Win64; x64; rv:75.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0
Referer:
www.google.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip

Appendix: MITRE ATT&CK Framework

Technique	Description
T1027	Obfuscated Files or Information
T1027.002	Software Packing
T1059.003	Windows Command Shell
T1071.001	Web Protocols
T1105	Ingress Tool Transfer
T1140	Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information
T1573.001	Symmetric Cryptography

Appendix: Detecting the Techniques

FireEye security solutions provide detection of the SUNSHUTTLE
activity across email, endpoint and network levels. The following is a
snapshot of existing detections related to activity outlined in this
blog post.

width="414" valign="top">

Malware Protection (AV/MG)

Trojan.GenericKD.34453763

Generic.mg.9466c865f7498a35

Platform(s)	Detection Name
Network Security Email Security Detection On Demand Malware File Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning	FE_APT_Backdoor_Win64_SUNSHUTTLE_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win_SUNSHUTTLE_1 APT.Backdoor.Win.SUNSHUTTLE APT.Backdoor.Win.SUNSHUTTLE.MVX
Endpoint Security

Source: New SUNSHUTTLE Second-Stage Backdoor Uncovered Targeting U.S.-Based
Entity; Possible Connection to UNC2452