Dancho Danchev's Blog - Mind Streams of Information Security Knowledge

Summarizing Zero Day's Posts for June

July 01, 2009

The following is a brief summary of all of my posts at ZDNet's Zero Day for June.

You can also go through previous summaries for May, April, March, February, January, December, November, October, September, August and July, as well as subscribe to my personal RSS feed or Zero Day's main feed.

Notable articles include: Microsoft study debunks profitability of the underground economy; Overall spam volume unaffected by 3FN/Pricewert's ISP shutdown and Iranian opposition launches organized cyber attack against pro-Ahmadinejad sites.

01. Email service provider: 'Hack into our CEO's email, win $10k'
02. 419 scammers using NYTimes.com 'email this feature'
03. Microsoft study debunks profitability of the underground economy
04. Malware poses as fake Yellowsn0w iPhone unlocker
05. Cybercriminals hijack Twitter trending topics to serve malware
06. Overall spam volume unaffected by 3FN/Pricewert's ISP shutdown
07. Mac OS X malware posing as fake video codec discovered
08. Researchers demo wireless keyboard sniffer for Microsoft 27Mhz keyboards
09. China confirms security flaws in Green Dam, rushes to release a patch
10. Iranian opposition launches organized cyber attack against pro-Ahmadinejad sites
11. Fake Microsoft patches themed malware campaigns spreading
12. Remote code execution exploit for Green Dam in the wild
13. Secunia: Average insecure program per PC rate remains high
14. Michael Jackson's death themed malware campaigns spreading Continue reading →

Ethiopian Embassy in Washington D.C Serving Malware - Part Two

June 25, 2009

Can a lightning strike the same place twice? In the world of cybercrime, there's no such thing as a coincidence especially when it comes to multiple malware embedded embassy web sites during the past couple of months courtesy of a single group, with soft-drinks themed redirectors establishing a direct connection with a well known RBN domain from the not so distance past.

Related posts:
Embassy of Portugal in India Serving Malware

Ethiopian Embassy in Washington D.C Serving Malware
USAID.gov compromised, malware and exploits served
Azerbaijanian Embassies in Pakistan and Hungary Serving Malware
Embassy of India in Spain Serving Malware
Embassy of Brazil in India Compromised
The Dutch Embassy in Moscow Serving Malware
U.S Consulate in St. Petersburg Serving Malware
Syrian Embassy in London Serving Malware
French Embassy in Libya Serving Malware Continue reading →

A Peek Inside the Managed Blackhat SEO Ecosystem

June 24, 2009

Ever wondered how are thousands of bogus accounts across multiple Web services, automatically generated with built-in monetization channels consisting of scareware, malware to the use of legitimate affiliate links from major ad networks?

Through several clicks or if complete automation and experience count, through outsourcing the process to a managed blackhat SEO provider that wouldn't charge you for the product, but for the service offered. Let's take a peek at some of the currently available DIY tools, and what a managed blackhat SEO service provider has to offer.

Take for instance the "professional blackhat SEO" expert featured here. His ongoing Twitter spam campaigns are in fact so successfully hijacking trending topics that at first they looked like your typical scareware serving campaign. What both sides have in common are spamming techniques used.

However, the tactics vary and indicate an interesting shift from the typical outsourcing of CAPTCHA recognition for the purpose of storing the blackhat SEO content on the legitimate provider's services. In order to scale more efficiently, several currently active managed blackhat SEO providers that have vertically integrated to the point where they manage their own blackhat SEO friendly ISP.

By doing so, their bogus account generating platforms are capable of achieving speeds that would be otherwise either impossible or impractical to set as objectives through outsourced CAPTCHA-recognition - 2,931 bogus Wordpress accounts with template based blackhat SEO content generated in 1 second using their own managed infrastructure. The following screenshots provide an inside peek into one of the products offered by the "professional blackhat SEO expert" :

What took place in one second, was the generation of thousands of bogus accounts with descriptive blackhat SEO subdomains, with the bogus content pulled/scrapped from legitimate and real-time news providers, with the entire operation run as a managed service, or the tool itself offered for sale. As in every other managed underground service, customization plays a major role that is often the key benchmark for judging a particular product next to another. Customization in respect to this particular tool comes under the form of numerous Wordpress templates that can be randomly used during the registration process:

Static customization is one thing, dynamic customization is entirely another. The product, and consequently the managed service are offering the ability to automatically add Ebay and Amazon listings with the user's unique affiliate code posted within the bogus content:

The practice of affiliate network fraud -- excluding the cybersquatting as a prerequisite for it success -- was recently mentioned as a much more lucrative fraudulent practice than the pay-per-click model, which entirely depends on the fraudster's knowledge of which is the monetization model with the highest pay-out rates:

"Some companies offer legitimate affiliate programs that allow third-party Web site owners to post links and banners with the company’s branded content on their site or to send traffic to the company’s site directly through domain forwards. In return, the owner of the site hosting the link receives a commission for every click-through that results in a purchase. This lucrative commission structure has enticed cybercriminals to take advantage of affiliate programs by registering typo domains that redirect to legitimate content and enable them to collect affiliate fees."

Next to the malware/scareware serving Twitter campaigns, affiliate network fraud is also very common at the ever-growing micro-blogging service, whose lack of common sense account registration practices -- Twitter doesn't require a valid email, neither does it require an email confirmation upon registrating an account -- makes the practice of generating bogus accounts a child's play.

The bottom line - is the managed blackhat SEO hosting service ($500 per month and $5000 for one year for unlimited domains/subdomains/traffic/disk space package) the future, or are we going to continue seeing the systematic abuse of legitimate service's infrastructure through outsourced CAPTCHA recognition? I'd go for the second due to a simple reason - it's more cost-effective than the managed service at least for the time being. In the long term, once it achieves its logical "malicious economies of scale" the hosting and process would become cheaper thereby attracting more customers.

Recommended reading -
Outsourced CAPTCHA recognition:
Community-driven Revenue Sharing Scheme for CAPTCHA Breaking
The Unbreakable CAPTCHA
Spammers attacking Microsoft's CAPTCHA -- again
Spam coming from free email providers increasing
Gmail, Yahoo and Hotmail’s CAPTCHA broken by spammers
Microsoft’s CAPTCHA successfully broken
Vladuz's Ebay CAPTCHA Populator
Spammers and Phishers Breaking CAPTCHAs
DIY CAPTCHA Breaking Service
Which CAPTCHA Do You Want to Decode Today?

Managed Cybercrime-facilitating services/tools:
Commercial Twitter spamming tool hits the market
Zeus Crimeware as a Service Going Mainstream
Managed Fast-Flux Provider
Managed Fast Flux Provider - Part Two
76Service - Cybercrime as a Service Going Mainstream
Inside (Yet Another) Managed Spam Service
Inside a DIY Image Spam Generating Traffic Management Kit
Quality Assurance in a Managed Spamming Service
Managed Spamming Appliances - The Future of Spam
Dissecting a Managed Spamming Service
Inside a Managed Spam Service
Spamming vendor launches managed spamming service

Cybersquatting/Per Pay Click Fraud:
Exposing a Fraudulent Google AdWords Scheme
Botnets committing click fraud observed
Click Fraud, Botnets and Parked Domains - All Inclusive
Cybersquatting Security Vendors for Fraudulent Purposes
Cybersquatting Symantec's Norton AntiVirus
The State of Typosquatting - 2007

This post has been reproduced from Dancho Danchev's blog. Continue reading →

From Ukraine with Scareware Serving Tweets, Bogus LinkedIn/Scribd Accounts, and Blackhat SEO Farms

June 17, 2009

UPDATE: In less than half an hour upon notification, Twitter and LinkedIn have already removed the bogus accounts.

UPDATE2: Forty five minutes later Scribd removes the bogus accounts.

As usual, persistence must be met with persistence. A single blackhat SEO group -- if well analyzed and monitored -- has the potential to provide an insight into some of the current monetization tactics which cybecriminals use, as well as directly demonstrate the (automatic) impact they have across different Web 2.0 services.

What is my "fan club" up to anyway? Covering up their weekend's Twitter campaign that was serving scareware by using a new template, and once again diversifying - this time by managing a bogus LinkedIn accounts campaign, another one on Scribd, followed by another another currently active one on Twitter, in between increasing the size of their blackhat SEO farm at is-the-boss.com.

Moreover, for the first time ever, the group is starting to serve live exploits based on a bit.ly URL shortening service referrer, like the ones used in the latest Twitter campaign. The use of Arbitrary file download via the Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) exploits is done to ultimately drop a new Koobface variant, making this the second time the group is pushing Koobface variants beyond Facebook.

Let's summarize their activities during the past six days starting with the weekend's campaign across Twitter.

Upon clicking on the TinyURL, the user is redirected through their well known 66.199.229 .253/etds (66.199.229 .253/etds/go.php?sid=41; 66.199.229 .253/etds/got.php?sid=41; 66.199.229 .253/etds/go.php?sid=43; 66.199.229 .253/etds/got.php?sid=43) traffic management location, to end up at the scareware av4best .net (64.86.17.47) with a new template is served (FakeAlert-EA).

Parked on the same IP are also well known scareware domains known from their previous campaigns, namely fast-antivirus .com and viruscatcher .net. The scareware message used in the new template takes you back to the good old school MS-DOS days :

"A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.

Initialization_failed C:\WINDOWS\system32\himem.sys

If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart the computer. If this screen appears again, read information below: The reason why this might happen is the newest malicious software which blocks access to the system libraries. Check to make sure any new antivirus software is properly installed. We suggest you to download and install antivirus, new up-to-date software which specializes on detection and removal of malicious and suspicious software."

The messaged used in the weekend's Twitter campaign, as well as a graph on the peaks and downds for a particular keyword:

"Competitions video; What do you think about video; I know why Percent Of Accounts; Between food and gay; movie Trailler!; Sun eclipce free; Air France extreem; Tetris long and sweet; Take sex under control; alcohol long and sweet; Between food and SATs; What do you think about Autotune; Gotcha!, Palm Pre!; Goodnight high in the sky; What do you think about Hangover; Death of Autotune crack addict; Amazing. movie from MSFT; Amazing. Air France from MSFT; Sims 3, It's Cool!; video, It's Cool!; Manage Air France; Amazing. porn from MSFT; alcohol unbroken; Them girls Honduras; Between food and phish; Between food and Detroit; Tetris high in the sky; I know why iPhone; Futurama unbroken; Balls to the Woman Who Missed Air; alcohol high in the sky; follow the video"

Sample (now suspended) automatically registered accounts used in the weekend's campaign:
twitter .com/wenning351
twitter .com/ula475
twitter .com/escher338
twitter .com/ochs40
twitter .com/karlen131
twitter .com/cordes904
twitter .com/hecker905
twitter .com/bohl566
twitter .com/sattler649
twitter .com/hildegard115
twitter .com/andreas281
twitter .com/wassermann38
twitter .com/rummel980
twitter .com/guilaine896
twitter .com/orlowski781
twitter .com/rupette972
twitter .com/holzner473
twitter .com/dumke576
twitter .com/hilgers465
twitter .com/heese157
twitter .com/meier679
twitter .com/habel896
twitter .com/holzinger567
twitter .com/wilhelm578
twitter .com/dearg450
twitter .com/habicht717
twitter .com/ferde373
twitter.com/hass323
twitter .com/heckmann918
twitter .com/bruna555
twitter .com/wilbert25
twitter .com/eckart412
twitter .com/sperlich374
twitter .com/jahn562
twitter .com/ludvig30
twitter .com/bing274
twitter .com/fett628
twitter .com/brock93
twitter .com/mally981
twitter .com/merle752
twitter .com/axmann101
twitter .com/pelz478
twitter .com/renaud687
twitter .com/wienke879
twitter .com/hartinger619
twitter .com/chriselda988
twitter .com/kloos267
twitter .com/dreyer15
twitter .com/herta740
twitter .com/brauer427
twitter .com/nadina732
twitter .com/wenda245
twitter .com/rieken434
twitter.com/reinhard192
twitter .com/plath132
twitter .com/bick497
twitter .com/johannsen747
twitter .com/tacke432

Besides the TinyURL links used, they've also returned to temporarily using their original .us domains such as twitter .8w8.us - 82.146.51.126 - Email: ambersurman@gmail.com; 5us .us - 82.146.51.25 - Email: elchip0707@mail.ru, and girlstubes .cn 82.146.52.158 - Email: alexvasiliev1987@cocainmail.com with Alex Vasiliev's emails first noticed in the Diverse Portfolio of Fake Security Software - Part Nine and again in Part Twenty.

Now it's time to assess their currently active campaigns across Twitter, LinkedIn and Scribd, and connect the dots in the face of the single URL acting as a counter across all the campaigns - counteringate .com (194.165.4.77) which has already been profiled in their original massive blackhat SEO campaign, and still remains active.

The automatically registered and currently active Twitter accounts participating in the campaign are as follows, it's also worth pointing out that compared to their previous campaigns, in this way they've included relevant backgrounds and avatars to the Twitter accounts:

twitter .com/AshleyTisdal1
twitter .com/AnnaNicoleSmit
twitter .com/ParisHiltonjpg1
twitter .com/ParisHiltonmov1
twitter .com/ParisHiltonNake
twitter .com/ParisHiltonSex1
twitter .com/ParisHiltonNud2
twitter .com/ParisSexTape2
twitter .com/Britneynipslip1
twitter .com/Britneywomani
twitter .com/Britneystrip1
twitter .com/BritneySex
twitter .com/Britneycomix
twitter .com/Britneywomaniz
twitter .com/BritneyNaked2
twitter .com/britneysextape
twitter .com/BritneyxSpears1
twitter .com/Britneydesnuda1

twitter .com/LopezAss
twitter .com/jennifermorriso
twitter .com/JenniferTilly2
twitter .com/AnistonSexscen
twitter .com/AnistonBangs
twitter .com/JenniferTilly1
twitter .com/Jennifernude
twitter .com/JenniferConnel
twitter .com/JenniferGarner1
twitter .com/LopezNaked
twitter .com/AnistonSexiest
twitter .com/JenniferAnisto4
twitter .com/JenniferToastee

twitter .com/JenniferAnisto2
twitter .com/LoveHewitt1
twitter .com/JenniferLoveH1
twitter .com/JenniferGreyn
twitter .com/1JenniferAnisto
twitter .com/2JenniferAnisto
twitter .com/1JenniferLopez
twitter .com/Lopedesnuda1
twitter .com/ElishaCuthbert3

twitter .com/ElishaCuthbert1
twitter .com/AlysonHannigan2
twitter .com/AliciaMachado
twitter .com/AliLarterNaked
/twitter .com/AliLarterNude
twitter .com/MelissaJoanha
twitter .com/AishwaryaRaiN1

Upon clicking on bit .ly/Je2Sd, the user is redirected to oymomahon .com/mirolim-video/3.html - 216.32.86.106 Email: StaceyGuerreroSF@gmail.com, redirecting to myhealtharea .cn/in.cgi?13 and then to oymoma-tube .freehostia.com/x-tube.htm where the fake codec/scareware is served, downloaded from totalsitesarchive .com/error.php?id=62 - Trojan.Win32.FakeAV.nz which once executed phones back to bestyourtrust .com/in.php?url=5&affid=00262 (209.44.126.241) parked at the same IP are also the following scareware domains:

uniqtrustedweb .com
hortshieldpc .com
securetopshield .com
gisecurityshield .com
ourbestsecurityshield .com
intellectsecfind .com
thesecuritytree .com
godsecurityarchive .com
besecurityguardian .com
thefirstupper .com
securityshieldcenter .com
bitsecuritycenter .com
joinsecuritytools .com
hupersecuritydot .com
bestyourtrust .com
thetrueshiledsecurity .com
souptotalsecurity .com
scantrustsecurity .com

The second bit .ly/1a5ZsY link used in the Twitter campaign, is redirecting to showmealltube .com/paqi-video/7.html - 64.92.170.135 Email: zbestgotterflythe@gmail.com.

From there, the redirector myhealtharea .cn/in.cgi?12 - 216.32.83.110 - zbest2008@mail.ru again loads oymoma-tube.freehostia .com/tube.htm and most importantly the counter counteringate .com/count.php?id=186 which is using an IP known from their previous campaign (194.165.4.77).

Time to move on to the LinkedIn campaign, and establish a direct connection with the Twitter one, both maintained by the same group of cybercriminals.

Currently active and participating LinkedIn accounts:
linkedin .com/in/rihannanude
linkedin .com/in/rihannanude2
linkedin .com/in/nudecelebs
linkedin .com/in/britneyspearsnudee
linkedin .com/in/pamelaandersonnudee
linkedin .com/in/nudepreteen2
linkedin .com/in/tilatequilanudee
linkedin .com/pub/beyonce-nude/14/b/952
linkedin .com/pub/child-nude/13/b4b/a16
linkedin .com/in/nudemodels

linkedin .com/in/preteennude
linkedin .com/in/mariahcareynude3
linkedin .com/in/nudeboys
linkedin .com/in/evamendesnude2
linkedin .com/in/nudebeaches
linkedin .com/in/nudebabes

linkedin .com/in/nudewomen2
linkedin .com/pub/ashley-tisdale-nude/13/b4b/762
linkedin .com/pub/mila-kunis-nude/13/b4a/b99
linkedin .com/pub/nude-kids/13/b4b/aa
linkedin .com/pub/young-nude-girls/13/b4a/6a

The LinkedIn campaign is linking to the delshikandco .com, from where the user is redirected to the same domains used in the Twitter campaign, sharing the same celebrity theme - delshikandco .com/mirolim-video/3.html/delshikandco .com/paqi-video/1.html - 216.32.83.104 leads to myhealtharea .cn/in.cgi?12 to finally serve the codec at ymoma-tube.freehostia.com/xxxtube.htm or at tubes-portal.com/xplaymovie.php?id=40012 - 216.240.143.7, another IP that has already been profiled part of their previous campaigns.

Yet another nude themed campaign is operated by the same group at Scribd, linking to the already profiled delshikandco .com, used in both, Twitter's and LinkedIn's campaigns.

Currently active and participating Scribd accounts:
scribd .com/Stacy%20Keibler-nude
scribd .com/Vanessa_Hudgens%20nude
scribd .com/Jessica%20%20Simpson%20%20nude
scribd .com/MileyCyrus%20nude
scribd .com/KimKardashian%20%E2%80%98nude%E2%80%99
scribd .com/Carmen%20%20Electra%20nude
scribd .com/Jennifer%20Anistonnude
scribd .com/Paris-Hilton-nude3
scribd .com/Vida%20%20Guerra%20%20nude
scribd .com/nude2
scribd .com/Kim%20%20Kardashian%20nude
scribd .com/ZacEfron%20nude
scribd .com/BritneySpears%20nude
scribd .com/Hilary-Duff-nude%202
scribd .com/Angelina-Jolie-nude11
scribd .com/Vanessa-Hudgens-nude2
scribd .com/Natalie-Portman-nude2
scribd .com/JessicaAlba%20nude
scribd .com/Jennifer-Love-Hewitt-nude11

scribd .com/Kim-Kardashian-nude2
scribd .com/Jessica-Alba-nude11s
scribd .com/JENNIFER%20LOPEZ%20NUDE3
scribd .com/Elisha%20%20Cuthbert%20%20nude
scribd .com/Paris-Hilton-nude1
scribd .com/HilaryDuff%20nude
scribd .com/Megan-Fox-nude2
scribd .com/Britney-Spears-nude1
scribd .com/Candice%20%20Michelle%20nude
scribd .com/Lindsay-Lohan-nude3
scribd .com/Mila-Kunis-nude2
scribd .com/Miley%20Cyrus%20nude
scribd .com/Vanessa%20%20Anne%20%20Hudgens%20nude
scribd .com/rihanna-nude2
scribd .com/Jenny%20Mccarthy%20nude
scribd .com/Kim%20%20Kardashian%20%20nude
scribd .com/Olsen-Twins-nude2
scribd .com/Brooke-Hogan-nude2

scribd .com/DeniseRichardsnude2
scribd .com/Scarlett%20Johansson%20nude
scribd .com/miley-cyrus-nude
scribd .com/Celebrity%20%20nude
scribd .com/Lindsay-Lohan-nude2
scribd .com/Tila%20Tequila%20nude
scribd .com/Ashley%20Tisdale%20nude
scribd.com/Angelina-Jolie-nude2
scribd .com/Denise-Richards-nude-2
scribd .com/Britney%20Spears%20nude
scribd .com/Hayden%20Panettiere%20nude
scribd .com/Carmen-Electra-nude1
scribd .com/Brooke-Burke-nude2
scribd .com/Megan%20Fox%20nude
scribd .com/JessicaSimpson%20nude
scribd .com/Kendra-Wilkinson-nude2
scribd .com/DeniseRichardsnude
scribd.com/AngelinaJolie%20nude
scribd.com/Kate%20Mara%20nude
scribd .com/Eva%20Green%20nude
scribd .com/Mariah%20Carey%20nude

scribd .com/Britney-Spears-nude2
scribd .com/Paris%20Hilton%20nude
scribd .com/CHristina%20Applegate%20nude
scribd .com/Billie%20Piper%20nude
scribd .com/Rosario%20Dawson%20nude
scribd .com/Anna%20Kournikova%20nude
scribd .com/Jennifer-Love-Hewitt-nude2
scribd .com/Kate%20Winslet%20nude
scribd .com/Carmen%20Electra%20nude
scribd .com/Jennifer%20Love%20Hewitt%20nude
scribd .com/Vida%20Guerra%20nude
scribd .com/AnneHathaway%20nude
scribd .com/JenniferLopez_nude
scribd .com/Trish%20Stratus%20nude
scribd .com/Lindsay_Lohannude
scribd .com/Pamela%20Anderson%20nude3
scribd .com/Jessica-Simpson-nude3

scribd .com/JENNIFER%20LOPEZ%20NUDE
scribd .com/CHristina%20Aguilera%20nude
scribd .com/hilary%20duff%20nude
scribd .com/MariahCarey%20nude
scribd .com/JohnCena%20nude
scribd .com/Halle%20Berry%20nude
scribd .com/Amanda%20%20Beard%20%20nude
scribd .com/Patricia%20%20Heaton%20%20nude
scribd .com/Madonna%20nude
scribd .com/JenniferLopez%20nude
scribd .com/DeniseRichards%20nude

scribd .com/PatriciaHeaton%20nude
scribd .com/Celebrity%20nude
scribd .com/TilaTequila_nude
scribd .com/Hayden-Panettiere-nude2
scribd .com/Brenda-Song-nude2
scribd .com/Demi%20Moore%20nude
scribd .com/celebrity%20nude%201
scribd .com/JenniferLove%20Hewitt%20nude
scribd .com/Ashley_Harkleroad%20nude
scribd .com/AudrinaPatridge%20nude
scribd .com/PamelaAnderson%20nude
scribd .com/Anna%20Nicole%20Smithnude
scribd .com/Meg%20Ryan%20nude
scribd .com/Kate%20Hudsonnude

Now that all the campaigns are exposed in the naked fashion of their themes, it's worth emphasizing on the live exploits serving Koobface samples based on a bit.ly referrer - in this case the process takes place through myhealtharea .cn/in.cgi?13, which instead of redirecting to scareware domain as analyzed above, is redirecting to fast-fluxed set of IPs serving identical Koobface binary - myhealtharea .cn/in.cgi?13 loads r-cg100609 .com/go/?pid=30455&type=videxp (92.38.0.69) which redirectss to the live exploits/Koobface.

Parked on 92.38.0.69 are also the following domains:
er20090515 .com
upr0306 .com
cgpay0406 .com
r-cgpay-15062009 .com
r-cg100609 .com
trisem .com
uprtrishest .com
upr15may .com
rd040609-cgpay .net

Dynamic redirectors from r-cg100609 .com/go/?pid=30455&type=videxp on per session basis:
92.255.131 .217/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
92.255.131 .217/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
76.229.152 .148/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
76.229.152 .148/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=/setup.exe
189.97.106 .121/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
189.97.106 .121/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
117.198.91 .99/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
117.198.91 .99/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
79.18.18 .29/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
79.18.18 .29/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
85.253.62 .53/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
85.253.62 .53/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
79.164.220 .170/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
79.164.220 .170/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
59.98.104 .129/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
59.98.104 .129/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
78.43.24 .211/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
78.43.24 .211/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
62.98.63 .254/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
62.98.63 .254/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
84.176.74 .231/pid=30455/type=videxp/?ch=&ea=
84.176.74 .231/pid=30455/type=videxp/setup.exe
panmap .in/html/3003/25ee551429fcbfd75fe7bcfeba4a9cb8/ - 114.80.67.32 - charicard@googlemail.com

Parked on 114.80.67.32 are also:
managesystem32.com
napipsec.in
trialoc.in
pbcofig.in
pclxl.in
ifxcardm.in
ifmon.in
panmap.in
moricons.in
oeimport.in
ncprov.in

The served setup.exe (Win32/Koobface.BC; Worm:Win32/Koobface.gen!D;) samples phone back to a single location:- upr15may .com/achcheck.php; upr15may .com/ld/gen.php - 92.38.0.69; 61.235.117 .71/files/pdrv.exe

To further demonstrate the group's involvement in these campaigns, two active campaigns at is-the-boss.com indicate that they're also using the newly introduced counteringate.com, however, parked on the same IP as a previously analyzed redirector maintained bot the group.

A sample campaign is using the engseo .net/sutra/in.cgi?4&parameter=bravoerotica - 84.16.230.38 - Email: popkadyp@gmail.com as well as the warwork .info/cgi-bin/counter?id=945706&k=independent&ref= - 91.207.61.48 redirectors to load free-porn-video-free-porn .com/1/index.php?q=bravoerotica - 84.16.230.38 - Email: popkadyp@gmail.com serving a fake codec, and is also using the universal counter serving maintained by group counteringate .com/count.php?id=308.

A second sampled campaign at is-the-boss.com points to a new domain that is once again parked at a well known IP mainted by the gang - goldeninternetsites .com/go.php?id=2022&key=4c69e59ac&p=1 - 83.133.123.140 - known from previous campaigns.

The redirectors lead to anti-virussecurity3 .com - 69.4.230.204; 69.10.59.34; 83.133.115.9; 91.212.65.125 with more typosquatted "Personal Antivirus" scareware parked at these multiple IPs aimed to increase the life cycle of the campaign:
bestantiviruscheck2 .com
securitypcscanner2 .com
fastpcscan3 .com
goodantivirusprotection3 .com
antimalware-online-scanv3 .com
anti-malware-internet-scanv3 .com
antimalwareinternetproscanv3 .com
antimalwareonlinescannerv3 .com
anti-virussecurity3 .com
bestantispywarescanner4 .com
fastsecurityupdateserver .com

Personal Antivirus then phones back to startupupdates .com - 83.133.123.140 where more scareware is parked, with the domains known from previous campaigns:
bestwebsitesin2009 .com
live-payment-system .com
bestbuysoftwaresystem .com
antiviruspaymentsystem .com
bestbuysystem .com
homeandofficefun .com
advanedmalwarescanner .com
allinternetfreebies .com
goldeninternetsites .com
primetimeworldnews .com
liveavantbrowser2 .cn
momentstohaveyou .cn
worldofwarcry .cn
awardspacelooksbig .us

The affected services have been notified, blacklisting and take down of the participating domains is in progress.

This post has been reproduced from Dancho Danchev's blog. Continue reading →

Iranian Opposition DDoS-es pro-Ahmadinejad Sites

June 16, 2009

By utilizing the people's information warfare concept, Iranian opposition has managed to successfully organize a cyber attack against Tehran's regime (complete analysis) by using Twitter, web forums, and localization (translation) of the recruitment messages in order to seek assistance from foreigners.

So far, their rather simplistic denial of service tools has managed to disrupt access to key government web sites, and the intensity of the attacks is prone to increase since the opposition appears to be in a "learning mode".

What does "learning mode" stand for here? It's their current stage of experimentation clearly indicating their inexperience with such campaigns and DDoS attacks in general. The opposition's de-centralized chain of command isn't even speculating on the use of botnets, since the primitive multi-threaded Iranian connections hitting Iranian sites seems to achieve their effect.

From a strategic perspective, this internal unrest resulting in the disruption of key government web sites, the de-facto propaganda vehicles of the current government, is directly denying their ability to influence the population and the media, which on its way to find information is inevitably going to visit the working opposition web sites.

Moreover, the majority of people's information warfare driven cyber attacks we've seen during the past two years, have all been orbiting around the scenario where a foreign adversary is attacking your infrastructure from all over the world. But in the current situation, it's Iran's internal network that's self-eating itself, where the trade off for denying all the traffic would be the traffic which could be potentially influenced through PSYOPs (psychological operations).

What has changed since yesterday's real-time OSINT analysis? The web based "Page Rebooter" tool heavily advertised by the opposition has decided to stop offering the service due to the massive abuse:

"Unfortunately I have had to take the site down temporarily. The site was being used to attack other websites, until I can determine the source of these attacks, I have decided to keep it offline. My apologies to everyone who uses this site for it's intended purpose, hopefully we'll be back soon. I have now received several emails regarding this. Unfortunately, last night's spike in traffic cost me a lot of money in server costs, I therefore cannot afford to keep it online - even if the use is just. I have therefore decided to release the code for this site, so that you may create your own copies."

Meanwhile, the opposition has come up with a segmented targets list including hardline news portals, official Ahmadinejad sites, Iranian law enforcement sites, banks, judiciary and transportation sites, aiming to recruit international supporters:

"ALL PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD:

Please help us in a full-scale cyberwar againts the dictatorial brutal government of Ahmadinjead! Help Iranians to earn back their votes per instructions below:

Simply click on few of the following links (better too choose your selections from different categories); it opens the site in a new tab. It will not stop you from browsing but by sending a refresh signal to the target site will saturate it. By doing so, we can block Ahmadinjead's governments flow of information in many of its key components as shown below. Please help us and yourself from this lunatic who will push the world to world war III."

Following the updated list of targets, a new LOIC.exe DoS tool is being advertised. The tool is however, anything but sophisticated (it's been around since 6 Jul 2008) compared to even the average Russian DDoS bot. Combined, the simplistic nature of the opposition's attack tools indicates the lack of any in-depth understanding of information warfare principles, in times when other countries are already going beyond cyber warfare and aiming for the unrestricted warfare stage.

The Conspiracy Theory and the Facts
How is the Iranian government/regime responding to these attacks, is it striking back to the fullest extend speculated in a countless number of cyber warfare research papers? Moreover, can it actually attack the "adversaries" which in this case reside within the country's own network? Can we easily compare this unpleasant situation from an information warfare perspective to the ongoing discussions whether or not the Should the US Go Offensive In Cyberwarfare?, and "go offensive" against who at the first place? The hundreds of thousands of U.S based malware infected hosts operated by a foreign entity as the adversary while using the targeted country's infrastructure as a human shield?

That's a dilemma that Iran's government is currently facing, but let's connect the dots and prove that the Fars News Agency which is pro-Ahmadinejad, and maintains ties to the Iranian judiciary, has in fact participated in this "cyber warfare attack with sticks and stones".

The Fars News Agency has been under attack since the beginning of the campaign, approximately 48 hours ago, prompting the site -- just like many others -- to switch to "lite" versions taking into consideration the ongoing attacks wasting the sites' bandwidth.

In a desperate attempt to influence the outcome of the DDoS attack, Fars News included iFrames pointing to opposition and anti-Ahmadinejad news sites (balatarin.com; ghalamnews.com and mirhussein.com) in order to redirect some of the attack traffic to them. The campaigners noticed the change, but upon confirming that the opposition's web sites remain online even with the iFrames in place, decided to continue the attack.