In first year of new process for workers supporting labor investigations and enforcement actions, DHS has protected over one thousand workers
DHS announces process for requesting renewal of deferred action for these workers
WASHINGTON – Through the enhanced process announced one year ago, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in partnership with the Department of Labor and other federal, state and local labor agencies, has protected over one thousand noncitizen workers who were victims of, or witnesses to, a violation of labor rights. This process to streamline and expedite consideration of workers’ deferred action requests has maintained DHS’s longstanding practice of using its discretionary authority to consider labor and employment agency-related deferred action requests for workers on a case-by-case basis.
These improvements advance the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to empowering workers and to improving workplace conditions by enabling all workers, including noncitizens, to more freely assert their legal rights. Fear of reporting violations due to immigration-based retaliation can create an unfair labor market and perpetuate the commission of unlawful and inhumane acts by employers, ranging from nonpayment of wages to imposing unsafe working conditions and chilling workers’ ability to organize and collectively bargain to improve their work conditions. Workers can visit DHS.gov for additional information and to submit requests.
“Noncitizen workers should never be afraid to report exploitation in the workplace or fear retaliatory actions from an abusive employer,” said Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas. “No employer is above the law. DHS will work with our law enforcement partners to hold those who prey on the vulnerability of migrants accountable and provide protection to those who come forward to report abuse. Combatting labor exploitation helps ensure fair wages and safe working conditions for all workers in our country.”
DHS is announcing new guidance for noncitizen workers requesting a renewal of deferred action through these processes. A noncitizen granted deferred action based on a labor agency enforcement interest may request a subsequent period of deferred action for an additional two years when there continues to be an ongoing labor agency need. This will protect workers when the labor agency investigation or enforcement action has not yet concluded. DHS is also releasing information for labor agencies on how to provide updated statements describing the ongoing labor agency need.
Subsequent requests from workers must be accompanied by an updated statement from the labor agency explaining the continued need for workers to assist in their investigation or prosecution, or in the enforcement of any court order or settlement agreement.
Agencies tasked with enforcing labor and employment laws depend on the cooperation of these workers in their investigations and enforcement actions. DHS’s practice of offering discretionary protection on a case-by-case basis to workers increases the ability of labor and employment agencies to more fully investigate worksite violations and support those agencies in fulfilling their mission to hold abusive employers accountable through their enforcement actions.
Noncitizens can submit such requests to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) through a central intake point established specifically to support labor agency investigative and enforcement efforts. Learn about the process for workers and labor agencies.
During first in-person meeting of the Tribal Homeland Security Advisory Council, Tribal leaders from across the country shared perspectives on homeland security policies and practices that affect Tribal Nations and indigenous communities.
Last week, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas convened tribal representatives to discuss key challenges facing their communities, including the accessibility of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) grants, improving cyber resilience, and best practices to address the crisis of missing and murdered indigenous people. Subcommittees of the Tribal Homeland Security Advisory Council (THSAC) presented their recommendations to the full Council on ways the Department can address these challenges. This was the THSAC’s first in-person meeting since forming on September 7, 2022.
The Subcommittee on Accessibility to DHS Grants recommended that DHS improve access to grant programs for tribes and tribal communities. Key policy recommendations from the committee include the establishment of a more accessible grant and application process with more flexibility and improving the consultation process with tribes to ensure grant priorities match the needs of tribal communities. The subcommittee also proposed a few legislative recommendations that would require Congressional action.
The Subcommittee on Cybersecurity recommended that DHS improve accessibility to cybersecurity resources for tribes and tribal communities. Key recommendations included addressing the talent deficit of tribal cybersecurity professionals and providing equity assessments in rural regions to understand cybersecurity vulnerabilities in Tribal Nations.
The Subcommittee on Addressing the Crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) recommended that DHS improve its role in support of Executive Order 14053, which tasked the Department with providing support to federal partner agencies, including the Department of Justice, Department of the Interior, and the Department of Health and Human Services, with their efforts to combat the crisis of MMIP. Key recommendations include the creation of a secure, updated, and centralized Tribal Nation Platform for data collection and networking, and the consolidation of victim and survivor services under one platform to improve available resources.
The Tribal Homeland Security Advisory Council enables Tribal leaders to advise the Secretary on homeland security policies and practices that affect Indian Country and indigenous communities, in areas including emergency management, law enforcement, cybersecurity, domestic terrorism and targeted violence, and border security. The Council engages with DHS agencies and offices to produce recommendations and reports for the Secretary. The Council is charged with collaborating on all matters of homeland security.
The Tribal Homeland Security Advisory Council is one of four Councils of outside experts that provide advice and recommendations to the Secretary on matters related to various aspects of homeland security. The Faith-Based Security Advisory Council provides advice and recommendations to the Secretary and other senior leadership on matters related to protecting houses of worship, preparedness, and enhanced coordination with the faith community. The Homeland Security Academic Partnership Council provides strategic and actionable recommendations to the Secretary on campus safety and security, improved coordination, research priorities, hiring, and more. Members represent higher education associations, campus law enforcement, two- and four-year colleges and universities, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-Serving Institutions, Tribal Colleges, and Asian American and Pacific Islander-Serving Institutions. And the Homeland Security Advisory Council, comprised of private sector leaders, produced a record eight reports in 2023 for the Council on critical topics ranging from Customer Service to AI. These recommendations led to the development of new initiatives, like the Supply Chain Resilience Center, customer experience improvements across component agencies, and critical AI policy.
Source: United States Director of National Intelligence
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ODNI News Release No. 02-24
January 18, 2024
DNI Haines Welcomes Lt. Gen. Anthony R. Hale as Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence and Congratulates and Thanks Lt. Gen. Laura A. Potter
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Director of National Intelligence Avril D. Haines today issued the following statement:
“It is my great honor to welcome Lieutenant General Anthony ‘Tony’ R. Hale as the U.S. Army’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence (G-2). As a career intelligence officer with 34 years of service, Tony is an extraordinary leader who has developed the Army intelligence enterprise and profession over a lifetime of service, most recently through his leadership as the Commanding General and Commandant of the U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence at Fort Huachuca. I look forward to working with him in his new role.
“I would also like to congratulate Lieutenant General Laura A. Potter on her new assignment and thank her for her partnership and leadership of the Army intelligence enterprise over the past few years during this exceptionally dynamic period. Laura is an exceptional leader who makes everyone around her better, and what she has done for our community — both in evolving the organization she led but also as a member of the Intelligence Community’s Executive Committee (EXCOM) — in the last several years is truly remarkable. Laura’s extraordinary command of the details of our profession and strategic vision, combined with her selfless approach to command and care for those around her, makes her one of a kind. She balanced operations and crisis in this complex environment all while building a culture of continuous improvement and modernization to address emerging demands. As a true visionary and steward of the Army intelligence enterprise, her legacy lives on with us, and I only look forward to the next phase of her continued leadership and contributions to our Community as the Director of the Army Staff.”
Source: United States Director of National Intelligence
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ODNI News Release No. 01-24
January 17, 2024
DNI Haines Welcomes Michele Bredenkamp as the Director’s Advisor for Military Affairs
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Director of National Intelligence Avril D. Haines today issued the following statement:
“Congratulations to Michele Bredenkamp on her Senate confirmation for promotion to Lieutenant General in the United States Army and her arrival at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) as the next Director’s Advisor for Military Affairs! With her extensive experience, to include most recently leading the Army’s Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM) and previously serving in assignments as the Director of Intelligence, J2, for U.S. Forces Korea and the Vice Director for Intelligence for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, we are very lucky to have her. Michele is an extraordinary leader who brings truly exceptional integrity, expertise, and knowledge to the job of advising us on all military matters of importance to the IC’s work and to promote institutional activities and structures that allow us to better align our efforts with the Department of Defense in service of our national security. I very much welcome Michele to ODNI’s leadership team.”
Redesignation Allows Additional Eligible Syrian Nationals to Apply for TPS and Employment Authorization Documents
WASHINGTON– Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas today announced the extension and redesignation of Syria for Temporary Protected Status for 18 months, from April 1, 2024, to September 30, 2025, due to ongoing armed conflict and extraordinary and temporary conditions in Syria that prevent individuals from safely returning. The corresponding Federal Register notice provides information about how to register as a new or current beneficiary for TPS under Syria ’s extension and redesignation.
Secretary Mayorkas made the decision to extend and redesignate TPS for this population in consultation with interagency partners and with careful consideration of certain country conditions. The civil war in Syria has involved large-scale destruction of infrastructure, widespread civilian casualties, and human rights abuses and violations. The humanitarian consequences are dire, with mass displacement of civilians, high levels of food insecurity, and limited access to health care and clean water. These effects were compounded by the February 6, 2023 earthquakes, which further destroyed infrastructure, worsened the breakdown of the economy, and intensified demand on an already overburdened health care system.
Accompanying this announcement is a Special Student Relief notice for F-1 nonimmigrant students whose country of citizenship is Syria so that eligible students may request employment authorization, work an increased number of hours while school is in session, and reduce their course load while continuing to maintain F-1 status through the TPS designation period.
“We recognize the vulnerable status of Syrian nationals already present in the United States who cannot safely return home,” said Secretary Mayorkas. “We are therefore using the legal tool available to us to provide them with this much-needed humanitarian relief.”
A country may be designated for TPS when conditions in the country fall into one or more of the three statutory bases for designation: ongoing armed conflict, environmental disasters, or extraordinary and temporary conditions. Syria’s designation is based on ongoing armed conflict and extraordinary and temporary conditions, specifically, he serious threat posed by ongoing hostilities and human rights abuses by Syrian regime forces, terrorist groups and other non-state actors, food insecurity, spread of disease and mass displacement.
The extension of TPS for Syria allows approximately 6,200 current beneficiaries to retain TPS through September 5, 2025 if they continue to meet TPS eligibility requirements. The redesignation of Syria for TPS allows an estimated 2,000 additional Syrian nationals (or individuals having no nationality who last habitually resided in Syria) who have been continuously residing in the United States since January 25, 2024, to file initial applications to obtain TPS, if they are otherwise eligible. Syrians who were not residing in the United States as of January 25, 2024, are not eligible for TPS. The initial registration period for new applicants under the redesignation runs from January 29, 2024, through September 30, 2025.
Re-registration is limited to individuals who previously registered for and were granted TPS under Syria’s prior designation. Current Syrian TPS beneficiaries must re-register in a timely manner during the 60-day re-registration period from January 29, 2024, through March 29, 2024, to ensure they keep their TPS and employment authorization.
The Department of Homeland Security recognizes that not all re-registrants may receive a new Employment Authorization Document (EAD) before their current EAD expires and is automatically extending through March 31, 2025, the validity of certain EADs previously issued under Syria’s TPS designation.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will continue to process pending applications filed under previous TPS designations for Syria. Individuals with a pending Form I-821, Application for Temporary Protected Status, or a related Form I-765, Application for Employment Authorization, as of January 29, 2024, do not need to file either application again. If USCIS approves a pending Form I-821 or Form I-765 filed under the previous designation of TPS for Syria, USCIS will grant the individual TPS through Sept. 30, 2025, and issue an EAD valid through the same date.
Under the redesignation of Syria, eligible individuals who do not have TPS may submit an initial Form I-821, Application for Temporary Protected Status, during the initial registration period that runs from February 1, 2024, through Sept. 30, 2025. Applicants also may apply for TPS-related EADs and for travel authorization. Applicants can request an EAD by submitting a completed Form I-765, Application for Employment Authorization, with their Form I-821, or separately later.
The Federal Register notice explains eligibility criteria, timelines, and procedures necessary for current beneficiaries to re-register and renew their EAD, and for new applicants to submit an initial application under the redesignation and apply for an EAD.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are releasing this joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to disseminate known indicators of compromise (IOCs) and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) associated with threat actors deploying Androxgh0st malware. Multiple, ongoing investigations and trusted third party reporting yielded the IOCs and TTPs, and provided information on Androxgh0st malware’s ability to establish a botnet that can further identify and compromise vulnerable networks.
The FBI and CISA encourage organizations to implement the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this CSA to reduce the likelihood and impact of cybersecurity incidents caused by Androxgh0st infections.
Download the PDF version of this report:
TECHNICAL DETAILS
Note: This advisory uses the MITRE ATT&CK® for Enterprise framework, version 14. See the MITRE ATT&CK Tactics and Techniques section for a table of the threat actors’ activity mapped to MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques with corresponding mitigation and/or detection recommendations. For assistance with mapping malicious cyber activity to the MITRE ATT&CK framework, see CISA and MITRE ATT&CK’s Best Practices for MITRE ATT&CK Mapping and CISA’s Decider Tool.
Overview
Androxgh0st malware has been observed establishing a botnet [T1583.005] for victim identification and exploitation in target networks. According to open source reporting[1], Androxgh0st is a Python-scripted malware [T1059.006] primarily used to target .env files that contain confidential information, such as credentials [T1552.001] for various high profile applications (i.e., Amazon Web Services [AWS], Microsoft Office 365, SendGrid, and Twilio from the Laravel web application framework). Androxgh0st malware also supports numerous functions capable of abusing the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), such as scanning [T1046] and exploiting exposed credentials [T1078] and application programming interfaces (APIs) [T1114], and web shell deployment [T1505.003].
Targeting the PHPUnit
Androxgh0st malware TTPs commonly involves the use of scripts, conducting scanning [T1595] and searching for websites with specific vulnerabilities. In particular, threat actors deploying Androxgh0st have been observed exploiting CVE-2017-9841 to remotely run hypertext preprocessor (PHP) code on fallible websites via PHPUnit [T1190]. Websites using the PHPUnit module that have internet-accessible (exposed) /vendor folders are subject to malicious HTTP POST requests to the /vendor/phpunit/phpunit/src/Util/PHP/eval-stdin.php uniform resource identifier (URI). This PHP page runs PHP code submitted through a POST request, which allows the threat actors to remotely execute code.
Malicious actors likely use Androxgh0st to download malicious files [T1105] to the system hosting the website. Threat actors are further able to set up a fake (illegitimate) page accessible via the URI to provide backdoor access to the website. This allows threat actors to download additional malicious files for their operations and access databases.
Laravel Framework Targeting
Androxgh0st malware establishes a botnet to scan for websites using the Laravel web application framework. After identifying websites using the Laravel web application, threat actors attempt to determine if the domain’s root-level .env file is exposed and contains credentials for accessing additional services. Note:.env files commonly store credentials and tokens. Threat actors often target .env files to steal these credentials within the environment variables.
If the .env file is exposed, threat actors will issue a GET request to the /.env URI to attempt to access the data on the page. Alternatively, Androxgh0st may issue a POST request to the same URI with a POST variable named 0x[] containing certain data sent to the web server. This data is frequently used as an identifier for the threat actor. This method appears to be used for websites in debug mode (i.e., when non-production websites are exposed to the internet). A successful response from either of these methods allows the threat actors to look for usernames, passwords, and/or other credentials pertaining to services such as email (via SMTP) and AWS accounts.
Androxgh0st malware can also access the application key [TA0006] for the Laravel application on the website. If the threat actors successfully identify the Laravel application key, they will attempt exploitation by using the key to encrypt PHP code [T1027.010]. The encrypted code is then passed to the website as a value in the cross-site forgery request (XSRF) token cookie, XSRF-TOKEN, and included in a future GET request to the website. The vulnerability defined in CVE-2018-15133 indicates that on Laravel applications, XSRF token values are subject to an un-serialized call, which can allow for remote code execution. In doing so, the threat actors can upload files to the website via remote access.
Apache Web Server Targeting
In correlation with CVE-2021-41773, Androxgh0st actors have been observed scanning vulnerable web servers [T1595.002] running Apache HTTP Server versions 2.4.49 or 2.4.50. Threat actors can identify uniform resource locators (URLs) for files outside root directory through a path traversal attack [T1083]. If these files are not protected by the “request all denied” configuration and Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripts are enabled, this may allow for remote code execution.
If threat actors obtain credentials for any services using the above methods, they may use these credentials to access sensitive data or use these services to conduct additional malicious operations. For example, when threat actors successfully identify and compromise AWS credentials from a vulnerable website, they have been observed attempting to create new users and user policies [T1136]. Additionally, Andoxgh0st actors have been observed creating new AWS instances to use for conducting additional scanning activity [T1583.006].
INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE (IOCs)
Based on investigations and analysis, the following requests are associated with Androxgh0st activity:
Incoming GET and POST requests to the following URIs:
The threat actor can exploit a successfully identified Laravel application key to encrypt PHP code, which is then passed to the site as a value in the XSRF-TOKEN cookie.
The threat actor runs PHP code through a POST request to download malicious files to the system hosting the website.
MITIGATIONS
The FBI and CISA recommend implementing the mitigations below to improve your organization’s cybersecurity posture based on Androxgh0st threat actor activity. These mitigations align with the Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals (CPGs) developed by CISA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The CPGs provide a minimum set of practices and protections that CISA and NIST recommend all organizations implement. CISA and NIST based the CPGs on existing cybersecurity frameworks and guidance to protect against the most common and impactful threats, tactics, techniques, and procedures. Visit CISA’s Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals for more information on the CPGs, including additional recommended baseline protections.
These mitigations apply to all critical infrastructure organizations and network defenders. FBI and CISA recommend that software manufacturers incorporate secure by design principles and tactics into their software development practices, limiting the impact of actor techniques and strengthening their customers’ security posture. For more information on secure by design, see CISA’s Secure by Design webpage.
The FBI and CISA recommend network defenders apply the following mitigations to limit potential adversarial use of common system and network discovery techniques and to reduce the risk of compromise by actors using Androxgh0st malware.
Keep all operating systems, software, and firmware up to date. Specifically, ensure that Apache servers are not running versions 2.4.49 or 2.4.50. Timely patching is one of the most efficient and cost-effective steps an organization can take to minimize its exposure to cybersecurity threats. Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities in internet-facing systems.
Verify that the default configuration for all URIs is to deny all requests unless there is a specific need for it to be accessible.
Ensure that any live Laravel applications are not in “debug” or testing mode. Remove all cloud credentials from.env files and revoke them. All cloud providers have safer ways to provide temporary, frequently rotated credentials to code running inside a web server without storing them in any file.
On a one-time basis for previously stored cloud credentials, and on an on-going basis for other types of credentials that cannot be removed, review any platforms or services that have credentials listed in the.envfile for unauthorized access or use.
Scan the server’s file system for unrecognized PHP files, particularly in the root directory or /vendor/phpunit/phpunit/src/Util/PHP folder.
Review outgoing GET requests (via cURL command) to file hosting sites such as GitHub, pastebin, etc., particularly when the request accesses a .php file.
VALIDATE SECURITY CONTROLS
In addition to applying mitigations, FBI and CISA recommend exercising, testing, and validating your organization’s security program against the threat behaviors mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework in this advisory. The authoring agencies recommend testing your existing security controls inventory to assess how they perform against the ATT&CK techniques described in this advisory.
To get started:
Select an ATT&CK technique described in this advisory (see Tables 1-10).
Align your security technologies against the technique.
Test your technologies against the technique.
Analyze your detection and prevention technologies’ performance.
Repeat the process for all security technologies to obtain a set of comprehensive performance data.
Tune your security program, including people, processes, and technologies, based on the data generated by this process.
FBI and CISA recommend continually testing your security program, at scale, in a production environment to ensure optimal performance against the MITRE ATT&CK techniques identified in this advisory.
REPORTING
The FBI encourages organizations to report information concerning suspicious or criminal activity to their local FBI field office. With regards to specific information that appears in this CSA, indicators should always be evaluated in light of an organization’s complete security situation.
When available, each report submitted should include the date, time, location, type of activity, number of people, and type of equipment used for the activity, the name of the submitting company or organization, and a designated point of contact. Reports can be submitted to the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), a local FBI Field Office, or to CISA via its Incident Reporting System or its 24/7 Operations Center at report@cisa.gov or (888) 282-0870.
The information in this report is being provided “as is” for informational purposes only. FBI and CISA do not endorse any commercial entity, product, company, or service, including any entities, products, or services linked within this document. Any reference to specific commercial entities, products, processes, or services by service mark, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by FBI and CISA.
Will Also Introduce Online Filing for I-129 H-1B Petitions and H-1B I-907 Premium Processing Service
WASHINGTON—U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today announced the upcoming launch of a package of customer experience improvements for H-1B cap season. The measures are expected to increase efficiency and ease collaboration for organizations and their legal representatives.
USCIS will launch organizational accounts for non-cap filings and the fiscal year (FY) 2025 H-1B cap season. The introduction of organizational accounts will allow multiple individuals within an organization, such as a company or other business entity, and their legal representatives to collaborate on and prepare H-1B registrations, Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker, and associated Form I-907, Request for Premium Processing Service.
“USCIS is always striving to improve and streamline our processes, and this is a big step forward,” said USCIS Director Ur M. Jaddou. “Once we launch the organizational accounts and online filing of I-129 H-1B petitions, the entire H-1B lifecycle becomes fully electronic — from registration, if applicable, to our final decision and transmission to the Department of State.”
USCIS expects to launch the organizational accounts in February 2024, with online filing of Forms I-129 and I-907 following shortly thereafter. In addition to streamlining the Form I-129 H-1B petition process, these changes should help reduce duplicate H-1B registrations and other common errors.
USCIS will also transition the paper filing location for Forms I-129 and I-907 from service centers to the USCIS lockbox as part of our efforts to increase efficiency by standardizing processes and reducing costs.
USCIS will host two national engagements on organizational accounts on Jan. 23 and 24 as well as several smaller sessions leading up to the H-1B registration period to help guide organizations and legal representatives through the process. During these sessions individuals will have the opportunity to ask questions about the organizational accounts in preparation for the FY 2025 H-1B electronic registration process and launch of online filing of Form I-129 for H-1B petitions. USCIS encourages all individuals involved in the H-1B registration and petition filing process to attend these engagements. Invitations to these engagements will be sent later this month. Visit our Contact Public Engagement page to subscribe to notifications about upcoming engagements. Additional details regarding organizational accounts will be available on the H-1B Electronic Registration Process page.
For more information on USCIS and its programs, please visit uscis.gov or follow us on Twitter (@uscis), Instagram (/uscis), YouTube (/uscis), Facebook (/uscis), and LinkedIn (/uscis).
Note:This joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) is part of an ongoing #StopRansomware effort to publish advisories for network defenders that detail various ransomware variants and ransomware threat actors. These #StopRansomware advisories include recently and historically observed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs) to help organizations protect against ransomware. Visitstopransomware.govto see all #StopRansomware advisories and to learn more about other ransomware threats and no-cost resources.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are releasing this joint CSA to disseminate known IOCs and TTPs associated with the ALPHV Blackcat ransomware as a service (RaaS) identified through FBI investigations as recently as Dec. 6, 2023.
This advisory provides updates to the FBI FLASH BlackCat/ALPHV Ransomware Indicators of Compromise released April 19, 2022. Since previous reporting, ALPHV Blackcat actors released a new version of the malware, and the FBI identified over 1000 victims worldwide targeted via ransomware and/or data extortion.
FBI and CISA encourage critical infrastructure organizations to implement the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this CSA to reduce the likelihood and impact of ALPHV Blackcat ransomware and data extortion incidents.
In February 2023, ALPHV Blackcat administrators announced the ALPHV Blackcat Ransomware 2.0 Sphynx update, which was rewritten to provide additional features to affiliates, such as better defense evasion and additional tooling. This ALPHV Blackcat update has the capability to encrypt both Windows and Linux devices, and VMWare instances. ALPHV Blackcat affiliates have extensive networks and experience with ransomware and data extortion operations. According to the FBI, as of September 2023, ALPHV Blackcat affiliates have compromised over 1000 entities—nearly 75 percent of which are in the United States and approximately 250 outside the United States—, demanded over $500 million, and received nearly $300 million in ransom payments.
Download the PDF version of this report:
TECHNICAL DETAILS
Note: This advisory uses the MITRE ATT&CK® for Enterprise framework, version 14. See the MITRE ATT&CK Tactics and Techniques section for a table of the threat actors’ activity mapped to MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques. For assistance with mapping malicious cyber activity to the MITRE ATT&CK framework, see CISA and MITRE ATT&CK’s Best Practices for MITRE ATT&CK Mapping and CISA’s Decider Tool.
ALPHV Blackcat affiliates use advanced social engineering techniques and open source research on a company to gain initial access. Actors pose as company IT and/or helpdesk staff and use phone calls or SMS messages [T1598] to obtain credentials from employees to access the target network [T1586]. ALPHV Blackcat affiliates use uniform resource locators (URLs) to live-chat with victims to convey demands and initiate processes to restore the victims’ encrypted files.
After gaining access to a victim network, ALPHV Blackcat affiliates deploy remote access software such as AnyDesk, Mega sync, and Splashtop in preparation of data exfiltration. After gaining access to networks, ALPHV Blackcat affiliates use legitimate remote access and tunneling tools, such as Plink and Ngrok [S0508]. ALPHV Blackcat affiliates claim to use Brute Ratel C4 [S1063] and Cobalt Strike [S1054] as beacons to command and control servers. ALPHV Blackcat affiliates use the open source adversary-in-the-middle attack [T1557] framework Evilginx2, which allows them to obtain multifactor authentication (MFA) credentials, login credentials, and session cookies. The actors also obtain passwords from the domain controller, local network, and deleted backup servers to move laterally throughout the network [T1555].
To evade detection, affiliates employ allowlisted applications such as Metasploit. Once installed on the domain controller, the logs are cleared on the exchange server. Then Mega.nz or Dropbox are used to move, exfiltrate, and/or download victim data. The ransomware is then deployed, and the ransom note is embedded as a file.txt. According to public reporting, affiliates have additionally used POORTRY and STONESTOP to terminate security processes.
Some ALPHV Blackcat affiliates exfiltrate data after gaining access and extort victims without deploying ransomware. After exfiltrating and/or encrypting data, ALPHV Blackcat affiliates communicate with victims via TOR [S0183], Tox, email, or encrypted applications. The threat actors then delete victim data from the victim’s system.
ALPHV Blackcat affiliates offer to provide unsolicited cyber remediation advice as an incentive for payment, offering to provide victims with “vulnerability reports” and “security recommendations” detailing how they penetrated the system and how to prevent future re-victimization upon receipt of ransom payment.
MITRE ATT&CK TACTICS AND TECHNIQUES
See Table 1 through Table 3 for all referenced threat actor tactics and techniques in this advisory.
ALPHV Blackcat affiliates pose as company IT and/or helpdesk staff using phone calls or SMS messages to obtain credentials from employees to access the target network.
ALPHV Blackcat/ALPHV affiliates use the open-source framework Evilginx2 to obtain MFA credentials, login credentials, and session cookies for targeted networks.
INCIDENT RESPONSE
If compromise is detected, organizations should:
Quarantine or take offline potentially affected hosts.
Reimage compromised hosts.
Provision new account credentials.
Collect and review artifacts such as running processes/services, unusual authentications, and recent network connections.
Report the compromise or phishing incident to CISA via CISA’s 24/7 Operations Center (report@cisa.gov or 888-282-0870). State, local, tribal, or territorial government entities can also report to MS-ISAC (SOC@cisecurity.org or 866-787-4722).
To report spoofing or phishing attempts (or to report that you’ve been a victim), file a complaint with the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), or contact your local FBI Field Office to report an incident.
MITIGATIONS
These mitigations apply to all critical infrastructure organizations and network defenders. The FBI and CISA recommend that software manufactures incorporate secure-by-design and -default principles and tactics into their software development practices limiting the impact of ransomware techniques, thus, strengthening the security posture for their customers.
FBI and CISA recommend organizations implement the mitigations below to improve your organization’s cybersecurity posture based on threat actor activity and to reduce the risk of compromise by ALPHV Blackcat threat actors. These mitigations align with the Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals (CPGs) developed by CISA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The CPGs provide a minimum set of practices and protections that CISA and NIST recommend all organizations implement. CISA and NIST based the CPGs on existing cybersecurity frameworks and guidance to protect against the most common and impactful threats, tactics, techniques, and procedures. Visit CISA’s Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals for more information on the CPGs, including additional recommended baseline protections.
Secure remote access tools by:
Implementingapplication controls to manage and control execution of software, including allowlisting remote access programs. Application controls should prevent installation and execution of portable versions of unauthorized remote access and other software. A properly configured application allowlisting solution will block any unlisted application execution. Allowlisting is important because antivirus solutions may fail to detect the execution of malicious portable executables when the files use any combination of compression, encryption, or obfuscation.
Implementing FIDO/WebAuthn authentication or Public key Infrastructure (PKI)-based MFA [CPG 2.H]. These MFA implementations are resistant to phishing and not susceptible to push bombing or SIM swap attacks, which are techniques known be used by ALPHV Blackcat affiliates. See CISA’s Fact Sheet Implementing Phishing-Resistant MFA for more information.
Identify, detect, and investigate abnormal activity and potential traversal of the indicated ransomware with a networking monitoring tool. To aid in detecting ransomware, implement a tool that logs and reports all network traffic [CPG 5.1], including lateral movement activity on a network. Endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools are useful for detecting lateral connections as they have insight into common and uncommon network connections for each host.
Implement user training on social engineering and phishing attacks [CPG 2.I]. Regularly educate users on identifying suspicious emails and links, not interacting with those suspicious items, and the importance of reporting instances of opening suspicious emails, links, attachments, or other potential lures.
Implement internal mail and messaging monitoring. Monitoring internal mail and messaging traffic to identify suspicious activity is essential as users may be phished from outside the targeted network or without the knowledge of the organizational security team. Establish a baseline of normal network traffic and scrutinize any deviations.
Implement free security tools to prevent cyber threat actors from redirecting users to malicious websites to steal their credentials. For more information see, CISA’s Free Cybersecurity Services and Tools webpage.
Install and maintain antivirus software. Antivirus software recognizes malware and protects your computer against it. Installing antivirus software from a reputable vendor is an important step in preventing and detecting infections. Always visit vendor sites directly rather than clicking on advertisements or email links. Because attackers are continually creating new viruses and other forms of malicious code, it is important to keep your antivirus software up to date.
VALIDATE SECURITY CONTROLS
In addition to applying mitigations, CISA recommends exercising, testing, and validating your organization’s security program against the threat behaviors mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework in this advisory. CISA recommends testing your existing security controls inventory to assess how they perform against the ATT&CK techniques described in this advisory.
To get started:
Select an ATT&CK technique described in this advisory (see Tables 1-3).
Align your security technologies against the technique.
Test your technologies against the technique.
Analyze your detection and prevention technologies’ performance.
Repeat the process for all security technologies to obtain a set of comprehensive performance data.
Tune your security program, including people, processes, and technologies, based on the data generated by this process.
CISA and FBI recommend continually testing your security program, at scale, in a production environment to ensure optimal performance against the MITRE ATT&CK techniques identified in this advisory.
RESOURCES
DISCLAIMER
The information in this report is being provided “as is” for informational purposes only. CISA and FBI do not endorse any commercial entity, product, company, or service, including any entities, products, or services linked within this document. Any reference to specific commercial entities, products, processes, or services by service mark, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by CISA and FBI.
Note:This joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) is part of an ongoing #StopRansomware effort to publish advisories for network defenders that detail various ransomware variants and ransomware threat actors. These #StopRansomware advisories include recently and historically observed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs) to help organizations protect against ransomware. Visitstopransomware.govto see all #StopRansomware advisories and to learn more about other ransomware threats and no-cost resources.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and Australian Signals Directorate’s Australian Cyber Security Centre (ASD’s ACSC) are releasing this joint CSA to disseminate the Play ransomware group’s IOCs and TTPs identified through FBI investigations as recently as October 2023.
Since June 2022, the Play (also known as Playcrypt) ransomware group has impacted a wide range of businesses and critical infrastructure in North America, South America, and Europe. As of October 2023, the FBI was aware of approximately 300 affected entities allegedly exploited by the ransomware actors.
In Australia, the first Play ransomware incident was observed in April 2023, and most recently in November 2023.
The Play ransomware group is presumed to be a closed group, designed to “guarantee the secrecy of deals,” according to a statement on the group’s data leak website. Play ransomware actors employ a double-extortion model, encrypting systems after exfiltrating data. Ransom notes do not include an initial ransom demand or payment instructions, rather, victims are instructed to contact the threat actors via email.
The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC encourage organizations to implement the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this CSA to reduce the likelihood and impact of ransomware incidents. This includes requiring multifactor authentication, maintaining offline backups of data, implementing a recovery plan, and keeping all operating systems, software, and firmware up to date.
Download a PDF version of this report:
For a downloadable copy of IOCs, see:
TECHNICAL DETAILS
Note: This advisory uses the MITRE ATT&CK® for Enterprise framework, version 14. See the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise section for all referenced tactics and techniques. For assistance with mapping malicious cyber activity to the MITRE ATT&CK framework, see CISA and MITRE ATT&CK’s Best Practices for MITRE ATT&CK Mapping and CISA’s Decider Tool.
Initial Access
The Play ransomware group gains initial access to victim networks through the abuse of valid accounts [T1078] and exploitation of public-facing applications [T1190], specifically through known FortiOS (CVE-2018-13379 and CVE-2020-12812) and Microsoft Exchange (ProxyNotShell [CVE-2022-41040 and CVE-2022-41082]) vulnerabilities. Play ransomware actors have been observed to use external-facing services [T1133] such as Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) and Virtual Private Networks (VPN) for initial access.
Discovery and Defense Evasion
Play ransomware actors use tools like AdFind to run Active Directory queries [TA0007] and Grixba [1], an information-stealer, to enumerate network information [T1016] and scan for anti-virus software [T1518.001]. Actors also use tools like GMER, IOBit, and PowerTool to disable anti-virus software [T1562.001] and remove log files [T1070.001]. In some instances, cybersecurity researchers have observed Play ransomware actors using PowerShell scripts to target Microsoft Defender.[2]
Lateral Movement and Execution
Play ransomware actors use command and control (C2) applications, including Cobalt Strike and SystemBC, and tools like PsExec, to assist with lateral movement and file execution. Once established on a network, the ransomware actors search for unsecured credentials [T1552] and use the Mimikatz credential dumper to gain domain administrator access [T1003]. According to open source reporting [2], to further enumerate vulnerabilities, Play ransomware actors use Windows Privilege Escalation Awesome Scripts (WinPEAS) [T1059] to search for additional privilege escalation paths. Actors then distribute executables [T1570] via Group Policy Objects [T1484.001].
Exfiltration and Encryption
Play ransomware actors often split compromised data into segments and use tools like WinRAR to compress files [T1560.001] into .RAR format for exfiltration. The actors then use WinSCP to transfer data [T1048] from a compromised network to actor-controlled accounts. Following exfiltration, files are encrypted [T1486] with AES-RSA hybrid encryption using intermittent encryption, encrypting every other file portion of 0x100000 bytes. [3] (Note: System files are skipped during the encryption process.) A .play extension is added to file names and a ransom note titled ReadMe[.]txt is placed in file directory C:.
Impact
The Play ransomware group uses a double-extortion model [T1657], encrypting systems after exfiltrating data. The ransom note directs victims to contact the Play ransomware group at an email address ending in @gmx[.]de. Ransom payments are paid in cryptocurrency to wallet addresses provided by Play actors. If a victim refuses to pay the ransom demand, the ransomware actors threaten to publish exfiltrated data to their leak site on the Tor network ([.]onion URL).
Leveraged Tools
Table 1 lists legitimate tools Play ransomware actors have repurposed for their operations. The legitimate tools listed in this product are all publicly available. Use of these tools and applications should not be attributed as malicious without analytical evidence to support they are used at the direction of, or controlled by, threat actors.
Table 1: Tools Leveraged by Play Ransomware Actors
Name
Description
AdFind
Used to query and retrieve information from Active Directory.
Bloodhound
Used to query and retrieve information from Active Directory.
GMER
A software tool intended to be used for detecting and removing rootkits.
IOBit
An anti-malware and anti-virus program for the Microsoft Windows operating system. Play actors have accessed IOBit to disable anti-virus software.
PsExec
A tool designed to run programs and execute commands on remote systems.
PowerTool
A Windows utility designed to improve speed, remove bloatware, protect privacy, and eliminate data collection, among other things.
PowerShell
A cross-platform task automation solution made up of a command-line shell, a scripting language, and a configuration management framework, which runs on Windows, Linux, and macOS.
Cobalt Strike
A penetration testing tool used by security professionals to test the security of networks and systems. Play ransomware actors have used it to assist with lateral movement and file execution.
Mimikatz
Allows users to view and save authentication credentials such as Kerberos tickets. Play ransomware actors have used it to add accounts to domain controllers.
WinPEAS
Used to search for additional privilege escalation paths.
WinRAR
Used to split compromised data into segments and to compress files into .RAR format for exfiltration.
WinSCP
Windows Secure Copy is a free and open-source Secure Shell (SSH) File Transfer Protocol, File Transfer Protocol, WebDAV, Amazon S3, and secure copy protocol client. Play ransomware actors have used it to transfer data [T1048] from a compromised network to actor-controlled accounts.
Microsoft Nltest
Used by Play ransomware actors for network discovery.
Nekto / PriviCMD
Used by Play ransomware actors for privilege escalation.
Process Hacker
Used to enumerate running processes on a system.
Plink
Used to establish persistent SSH tunnels.
Indicators of Compromise
See Table 2 for Play ransomware IOCs obtained from FBI investigations as of October 2023.
Table 2: Hashes Associated with Play Ransomware Actors
Play ransomware actors use a double-extortion model for financial gain.
MITIGATIONS
These mitigations apply to all critical infrastructure organizations and network defenders. The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC recommend that software manufacturers incorporate secure-by-design and -default principles and tactics into their software development practices to limit the impact of ransomware techniques (such as threat actors leveraging backdoor vulnerabilities into remote software systems), thus, strengthening the security posture for their customers. For more information on secure by design, see CISA’s Secure by Design and Default webpage and joint guide.
The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC recommend organizations apply the following mitigations to limit potential adversarial use of common system and network discovery techniques and to reduce the risk of compromise by Play ransomware. These mitigations align with the Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals (CPGs) developed by CISA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The CPGs provide a minimum set of practices and protections that CISA and NIST recommend all organizations implement. CISA and NIST based the CPGs on existing cybersecurity frameworks and guidance to protect against the most common and impactful threats and TTPs. Visit CISA’s Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals for more information on the CPGs, including additional recommended baseline protections.
Implement a recovery plan to maintain and retain multiple copies of sensitive or proprietary data and servers [CPG 2.F, 2.R, 2.S] in a physically separate, segmented, and secure location (i.e., hard drive, storage device, the cloud).
Require all accounts with password logins (e.g., service account, admin accounts, and domain admin accounts) to comply with NIST’s standards for developing and managing password policies [CPG 2.C].
Use longer passwords consisting of at least 8 characters and no more than 64 characters in length [CPG 2.B];
Store passwords in hashed format using industry-recognized password managers;
Add password user “salts” to shared login credentials;
Refrain from requiring password changes more frequently than once per year. Note: NIST guidance suggests favoring longer passwords instead of requiring regular and frequent password resets. Frequent password resets are more likely to result in users developing password “patterns” cyber criminals can easily decipher.
Require administrator credentials to install software.
Keep all operating systems, software, and firmware up to date. Timely patching is one of the most efficient and cost-effective steps an organization can take to minimize its exposure to cybersecurity threats. Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities in internet-facing systems [CPG 1.E]. Organizations are advised to deploy the latest Microsoft Exchange security updates. If unable to patch, then disable Outlook Web Access (OWA) until updates are able to be undertaken. Also see Patching Applications and Operating Systems | Cyber.gov.au.
Segment networks [CPG 2.F] to prevent the spread of ransomware. Network segmentation can help prevent the spread of ransomware by controlling traffic flows between—and access to—various subnetworks and by restricting adversary lateral movement. Also see Implementing Network Segmentation and Segregation.
Identify, detect, and investigate abnormal activity and potential traversal of the indicated ransomware with a networking monitoring tool. To aid in detecting the ransomware, implement a tool that logs and reports all network traffic, including lateral movement activity on a network [CPG 1.E]. Endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools are particularly useful for detecting lateral connections as they have insight into common and uncommon network connections for each host.
Filter network traffic by preventing unknown or untrusted origins from accessing remote services on internal systems. This prevents actors from directly connecting to remote access services they have established for persistence. Also see Inbound Traffic Filtering – Technique D3-ITF.
Install, regularly update, and enable real time detection for antivirus software on all hosts.
Review domain controllers, servers, workstations, and active directories for new and/or unrecognized accounts [CPG 1.A, 2.O].
Audit user accounts with administrative privileges and configure access controls according to the principle of least privilege [CPG 2.E].
Consider adding an email banner to emails [CPG 2.M] received from outside your organization.
Disable hyperlinks in received emails.
Implement time-based access for accounts set at the admin level and higher. For example, the just-in-time (JIT) access method provisions privileged access when needed and can support enforcement of the principle of least privilege (as well as the Zero Trust model). This is a process where a network-wide policy is set in place to automatically disable admin accounts at the Active Directory level when the account is not in direct need. Individual users may submit their requests through an automated process that grants them access to a specified system for a set timeframe when they need to support the completion of a certain task.
Disable command-line and scripting activities and permissions. Privileged escalation and lateral movement often depend on software utilities running from the command line. If threat actors are not able to run these tools, they will have difficulty escalating privileges and/or moving laterally [CPG 2.E].
Maintain offline backups of data and regularly maintain backup and restoration [CPG 2.R]. By instituting this practice, an organization ensures they will not be severely interrupted, and/or only have irretrievable data.
Ensure backup data is encrypted, immutable (i.e., cannot be altered or deleted), and covers the entire organization’s data infrastructure [CPG 2.K].
VALIDATE SECURITY CONTROLS
In addition to applying mitigations, the FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC recommend exercising, testing, and validating your organization’s security program against the threat behaviors mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework in this advisory. The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC recommend testing your existing security controls inventory to assess how they perform against the ATT&CK techniques described in this advisory.
To get started:
Select an ATT&CK technique described in this advisory (see Tables 3-11).
Align your security technologies against this technique.
Test your technologies against this technique.
Analyze your detection and prevention technologies performance.
Repeat the process for all security technologies to obtain a set of comprehensive performance data.
Tune your security program, including people, processes, and technologies, based on the data generated by this process.
The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC recommend continually testing your security program at scale and in a production environment to ensure optimal performance against the MITRE ATT&CK techniques identified in this advisory.
RESOURCES
REPORTING
The FBI is seeking any information that can be shared, to include boundary logs showing communication to and from foreign IP addresses, a sample ransom note, communications with Play ransomware actors, Bitcoin wallet information, decryptor files, and/or a benign sample of an encrypted file.
The FBI, CISA, and ASD’s ACSC do not encourage paying ransom as payment does not guarantee victim files will be recovered. Furthermore, payment may also embolden adversaries to target additional organizations, encourage other criminal actors to engage in the distribution of ransomware, and/or fund illicit activities. Regardless of whether you or your organization have decided to pay the ransom, the FBI and CISA urge you to promptly report ransomware incidents to a local FBI Field Office, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), or CISA via CISA’s 24/7 Operations Center (report@cisa.gov or 888-282-0870).
Australian organizations that have been impacted or require assistance in regard to a ransomware incident can contact ASD’s ACSC via 1300 CYBER1 (1300 292 371), or by submitting a report to cyber.gov.au.
DISCLAIMER
The information in this report is being provided “as is” for informational purposes only. CISA and the FBI do not endorse any commercial entity, product, company, or service, including any entities, products, or services linked within this document. Any reference to specific commercial entities, products, processes, or services by service mark, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by CISA or the FBI.
In January 2023, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) conducted a Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (RVA) at the request of a Healthcare and Public Health (HPH) sector organization to identify vulnerabilities and areas for improvement. An RVA is a two-week penetration test of an entire organization, with one week spent on external testing and one week spent assessing the internal network. As part of the RVA, the CISA assessment team conducted web application, phishing, penetration, database, and wireless assessments. The assessed organization was a large organization deploying on-premises software.
During the one-week external assessment, the assessment team did not identify any significant or exploitable conditions in externally available systems that may allow a malicious actor to easily obtain initial access to the organization’s network. Furthermore, the assessment team was unable to gain initial access to the assessed organization through phishing. However, during internal penetration testing, the team exploited misconfigurations, weak passwords, and other issues through multiple attack paths to compromise the organization’s domain.
In coordination with the assessed organization, CISA is releasing this Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) detailing the RVA team’s activities and key findings to provide network defenders and software manufacturers recommendations for improving their organizations’ and customers’ cyber posture, which reduces the impact of follow-on activity after initial access. CISA encourages the HPH sector and other critical infrastructure organizations deploying on-premises software, as well as software manufacturers, to apply the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this CSA to harden networks against malicious activity and to reduce the likelihood of domain compromise.
Download the PDF version of this report:
TECHNICAL DETAILS
Note: This advisory uses the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework, version 14. See the MITRE ATT&CK Tactics and Techniques section for tables of the threat actors’ activity mapped to MITRE ATT&CK® tactics and techniques with corresponding mitigation and/or detection recommendations. For assistance with mapping malicious cyber activity to the MITRE ATT&CK framework, see CISA and MITRE ATT&CK’s Best Practices for MITRE ATT&CK Mapping and CISA’s Decider Tool.
Introduction
CISA has authority to, upon request, provide analyses, expertise, and other technical assistance to critical infrastructure owners and operators and provide operational and timely technical assistance to federal and non-federal entities with respect to cybersecurity risks. See generally 6 U.S.C. §§ 652(c)(5), 659(c)(6). After receiving a request for an RVA from the organization and coordinating high-level details of the engagement with certain personnel at the organization, CISA conducted the RVA in January 2023.
During RVAs, CISA tests the security posture of an organization’s network over a two-week period to determine the risk, vulnerability, and exploitability of systems and networks. During the first week (the external phase), the team tests public facing systems to identify exploitable vulnerabilities. During the second week (the internal phase), the team determines the susceptibility of the environment to an actor with internal access (e.g., malicious cyber actor or insider threat). The assessment team offers five services:
Web Application Assessment: The assessment team uses commercial and open source tools to identify vulnerabilities in public-facing and internal web applications, demonstrating how they could be exploited.
Phishing Assessment: The assessment team tests the susceptibility of staff and infrastructure to phishing attacks and determines what impact a phished user workstation could have on the internal network. The RVA team crafts compelling email pretexts and generates payloads, similar to ones used by threat actors, in order to provide a realistic threat perspective to the organization.
Penetration Testing: The assessment team tests the security of an environment by simulating scenarios an advanced cyber actor may attempt. The team’s goals are to establish a foothold, escalate privileges, and compromise the domain. The RVA team leverages both open source and commercial tools for host discovery, port and service mapping, vulnerability discovery and analysis, and vulnerability exploitation.
Database Assessment: The assessment team uses commercial database tools to review databases for misconfigurations and missing patches.
Wireless Assessment: The assessment team uses specialized wireless hardware to assess wireless access points, connected endpoints, and user awareness for vulnerabilities.
The assessed organization was in the HPH sector. See Table 1 for services in-scope for this RVA.
Table 1: In-Scope RVA Services
Phase
Scope
Services
External Assessment
Publicly available HPH-organization endpoints discovered during scanning
Penetration Testing
Phishing Assessment
Web Application Assessment
Internal Assessment
Internally available HPH-organization endpoints discovered during scanning
Database Assessment
Penetration Testing
Web Application Assessment
Wireless Assessment
Phase I: External Assessment
Penetration and Web Application Testing
The CISA team did not identify any significant or exploitable conditions from penetration or web application testing that may allow a malicious actor to easily obtain initial access to the organization’s network.
Phishing Assessment
The CISA team conducted phishing assessments that included both user and systems testing.
The team’s phishing assessment was unsuccessful because the organization’s defensive tools blocked the execution of the team’s payloads. The payload testing resulted in most of the team’s payloads being blocked by host-based protections through a combination of browser, policy, and antivirus software. Some of the payloads were successfully downloaded to disk without being immediately removed, but upon execution, the antivirus software detected the malicious code and blocked it from running. Some payloads appeared to successfully evade host-based protections but did not create a connection to the command and control (C2) infrastructure, indicating they may have been incompatible with the system or blocked by border protections.
Since none of the payloads successfully connected to the assessment team’s C2 server, the team conducted a credential harvesting phishing campaign. Users were prompted to follow a malicious link within a phishing email under the pretext of verifying tax information and were then taken to a fake login form.
While twelve unique users from the organization submitted credentials through the malicious form, the CISA team was unable to leverage the credentials because they had limited access to external-facing resources. Additionally, the organization had multi-factor authentication (MFA) implemented for cloud accounts. Note: At the time of the assessment, the CISA team’s operating procedures did not include certain machine-in-the-middle attacks that could have circumvented the form of MFA in place. However, it is important to note that tools like Evilginx[1] can be leveraged to bypass non-phishing resistant forms of MFA. Furthermore, if a user executes a malicious file, opening a connection to a malicious actor’s command and control server, MFA will not prevent the actor from executing commands and carrying out actions under the context of that user.
Phase II: Internal Assessment
Database, Web Application, and Wireless Testing
The CISA assessment team did not identify any significant or exploitable conditions from database or wireless testing that may allow a malicious actor to easily compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the tested environment.
The team did identify default credentials [T1078.001] for multiple web interfaces during web application testing and used default printer credentials while penetration testing. (See the Attack Path 2 section for more information.)
Penetration Testing
The assessment team starts internal penetration testing with a connection to the organization’s network but without a valid domain account. The team’s goal is to compromise the domain by gaining domain admin or enterprise administrator-level permissions. Generally, the team first attempts to gain domain user access and then escalate privileges until the domain is compromised. This process is called the “attack path”—acquiring initial access to an organization and escalating privileges until the domain is compromised and/or vital assets for the organization are accessed. The attack path requires specialized expertise and is realistic to what adversaries may do in an environment.
For this assessment, the team compromised the organization’s domain through four unique attack paths, and in a fifth attack path the team obtained access to sensitive information.
See the sections below for a description of the team’s attack paths mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework. See the Findings section for information on issues that enabled the team to compromise the domain.
Attack Path 1
The assessment team initiated LLMNR/NBT-NS/mDNS/DHCP poisoning [T1557.001] with Responder[2], which works in two steps:
Responder listens to multicast name resolution queries (e.g., LLMNR UDP/5355, NBTNS UDP/137) [T1040] and under the right conditions spoofs a response to direct the victim host to a CISA-controlled machine on which Responder is running.
Once a victim connects to the machine, Responder exploits the connection to perform malicious functions such as stealing credentials or opening a session on a targeted host [T1021].
With this tool, the CISA team captured fifty-five New Technology Local Area Network Manager version 2 (NTLMv2) hashes, including the NTLMv2 hash for a service account. Note: NTLMv2 and other variations of the hash protocol are used for clients to join a domain, authenticate between Active Directory forests, authenticate between earlier versions of Windows operating systems (OSs), and authenticate computers that are not normally a part of the domain.[3] Cracking these passwords may enable malicious actors to establish a foothold in the domain and move laterally or elevate their privileges if the hash belongs to a privileged account.
The service account had a weak password, allowing the team to quickly crack it [T1110.002] and obtain access to the organization’s domain. With domain access, the CISA assessment team enumerated accounts with a Service Principal Name (SPN) set [T1087.002]. SPN is the unique service identifier used by Kerberos authentication[4], and accounts with SPN are susceptible to Kerberoasting.
The CISA team used Impacket’s[5] GetUserSPNs tool to request Ticket-Granting Service (TGS) tickets for all accounts with SPN set and obtained their Kerberos hashes [T1558.003]. Three of these accounts had domain administrator privileges—offline, the team cracked ACCOUNT 1 (which had a weak password).
Using CrackMapExec[6], the assessment team used ACCOUNT 1 [T1078.002] to successfully connect to a domain controller (DC). The team confirmed they compromised the domain because ACCOUNT 1 had READ,WRITE permissions over the C$ administrative share [T1021.002] (see Figure 1).
Figure 1: ACCOUNT 1 Domain Admin Privileges
To further demonstrate the impact of compromising ACCOUNT 1, the assessment team used it to access a virtual machine interface. If a malicious actor compromised ACCOUNT 1, they could use it to modify, power off [T1529], and/or delete critical virtual machines, including domain controllers and file servers.
Attack Path 2
The team first mapped the network to identify open web ports [T1595.001], and then attempted to access various web interfaces [T1133] with default administrator credentials. The CISA team was able to log into a printer interface with a default password and found the device was configured with domain credentials to allow employees to save scanned documents to a network share [T1080].
While logged into the printer interface as an administrator, the team 1) modified the “Save as file” configuration to use File Transfer Protocol (FTP) instead of Server Message Block (SMB) and 2) changed the Server Name and Network Path to point to a CISA-controlled machine running Responder [T1557]. Then, the team executed a “Connection Test” that sent the username and password over FTP [T1187] to the CISA machine running Responder, which captured cleartext credentials for a non-privileged domain account (ACCOUNT 2).
Using ACCOUNT 2 and Certipy[7], the team enumerated potential certificate template vulnerabilities found in Active Directory Certificate Services (ADCS). Note: ADCS templates are used to build certificates for different types of servers and other entities on an organization’s network. Malicious actors can exploit template misconfigurations [T1649] to manipulate the certificate infrastructure into issuing fraudulent certificates and/or escalate user privileges to a domain administrator.
The WebServer template was misconfigured to allow all authenticated users permission to:
Change the properties of the template (via Object Control Permissions with Write Property Principals set to Authenticated Users).
Enroll for the certificate (via Enrollment Permissions including the Authenticated Users group).
Request a certificate for a different user (via EnrolleeSuppliesSubject set as True).
See Figure 2 for the displayed certificate template misconfigurations.
The template’s Client Authentication was set to False, preventing the CISA assessment team from requesting a certificate that could be used to authenticate to a server in the domain. To demonstrate how this misconfiguration could lead to privilege escalation, the assessment team, leveraging its status as a mere authenticated user, briefly changed the WebServer template properties to set Client Authentication to True so that a certificate could be obtained for server authentication, ensuring the property was set back to its original setting of False immediately thereafter.
The team used Certipy with the ACCOUNT 2 credentials to request a certificate for a Domain Administrator account (ACCOUNT 3). The team then authenticated to the domain controller as ACCOUNT 3 with the generated certificate [T1550] and retrieved the NTLM hash for ACCOUNT 3 [T1003]. The team used the hash to authenticate to the domain controller [T1550.002] and validated Domain Administrator privileges, demonstrating compromise of the domain via the WebServer template misconfiguration.
Attack Path 3
The CISA team used a tool called CrackMapExec to spray easily guessable passwords [T1110.003] across all domain accounts and obtained two sets of valid credentials for standard domain user accounts.
The assessment team leveraged one of the domain user accounts (ACCOUNT 4) to enumerate ADCS via Certipy and found that web enrollment was enabled (see Figure 3). If web enrollment is enabled, malicious actors can abuse certain services and/or misconfigurations in the environment to coerce a server to authenticate to an actor-controlled computer, which can relay the authentication to the ADCS web enrollment service and obtain a certificate for the server’s account (known as a relay attack).
Figure 3: Misconfigured ADCS Enumerated via Certipy
The team used PetitPotam [8] with ACCOUNT 4 credentials to force the organization’s domain controller to authenticate to the CISA-operated machine and then used Certipy to relay the coerced authentication attempt to the ADCS web enrollment service to receive a valid certificate for ACCOUNT 5, the domain controller machine account. They used this certificate to acquire a TGT [T1558] for ACCOUNT 5.
With the TGT for ACCOUNT 5, the CISA team used DCSync to dump the NTLM hash [T1003.006] for ACCOUNT 3 (a Domain Administrator account [see Attack Path 2 section]), effectively leading to domain compromise.
Attack Path 4
The CISA team identified several systems on the organization’s network that do not enforce SMB signing. The team exploited this misconfiguration to obtain cleartext credentials for two domain administrator accounts.
First, the team used Responder to capture the NTLMv2 hash for a domain administrator account. Next, they used Impacket’s NTLMrelayx tool[9] to relay the authentication for the domain administrator, opening a SOCKS connection on a host that did not enforce SMB signing. The team then used DonPAPI[10] to dump cleartext credentials through the SOCKS connection and obtained credentials for two additional domain administrator accounts.
The CISA team validated the privileges of these accounts by checking for READ,WRITE access on a domain controller C$ share [T1039], demonstrating Domain Administrator access and therefore domain compromise.
Attack Path 5
The team did vulnerability scanning [T1046] and identified a server vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (an Improper Input Validation [CWE-20] vulnerability known as “EternalBlue” that affects SMB version 1 [SMBv1] and enables remote code execution [see Figure 4]).
Figure 4: Checking for EternalBlue Vulnerability
The CISA assessment team then executed a well-known EternalBlue exploit [T1210] and established a shell on the server. This shell allowed them to execute commands [T1059.003] under the context of the local SYSTEM account.
With this local SYSTEM account, CISA dumped password hashes from a Security Account Manager (SAM) database [T1003.002]. The team parsed the hashes and identified one for a local administrator account. Upon parsing the contents of the SAM database dump, the CISA team identified an NTLM hash for the local administrator account, which can be used to authenticate to various services.
The team sprayed the acquired NTLM hash across a network segment and identified multiple instances of password reuse allowing the team to access various resources including sensitive information with the hash.
Findings
Key Issues
The CISA assessments team identified several findings as potentially exploitable vulnerabilities that could compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the tested environment. Each finding, listed below, includes a description with supporting details. See the Mitigations section for recommendations on how to mitigate these issues.
The CISA team rated their findings on a severity scale from critical to informational (see Table 2).
Table 2: Severity Rating Criteria
Severity
Description
Critical
Critical vulnerabilities pose an immediate and severe risk to the environment because of the ease of exploitation and potential impact. Critical items are reported to the customer immediately.
High
Malicious actors may be able to exercise full control on the targeted device.
Medium
Malicious actors may be able to exercise some control of the targeted device.
Low
The vulnerabilities discovered are reported as items of interest but are not normally exploitable. Many low items reported by security tools are not included in this report because they are often informational, unverified, or of minor risk.
Informational
These vulnerabilities are potential weaknesses within the system that cannot be readily exploited. These findings represent areas that the customer should be cognizant of, but do not require any immediate action.
The CISA assessment team identified four High severity vulnerabilities and one Medium severity vulnerability during penetration testing that contributed to the team’s ability to compromise the domain. See Table 3 for a list and description of these findings.
Table 3: Key Issues Contributing to Domain Compromise
As part of their assessment, the team reviewed the organization’s domain password policy and found it was weak because the minimum password length was set to 8 characters. Passwords less than 15 characters without randomness are easily crackable, and malicious actors with minimal technical knowledge can use these credentials to access the related services.
The assessment team was able to easily crack many passwords throughout the assessment to move laterally and increase access within the domain. Specifically, the team:
Cracked the NTLMv2 hash for a domain account, and subsequently accessed the domain. (See the Attack Path 1 section.)
Cracked the password hash (obtained via Kerberoasting) of a domain administrator account and subsequently compromised the domain. (See the Attack Path 1 section.)
Poor Credential Hygiene: Guessable Credentials
High
Penetration Testing
As part of the penetration test, the assessment team tested to see if one or more services is accessible using a list of enumerated usernames alongside an easily guessed password. The objective is to see if a malicious actor with minimal technical knowledge can use these credentials to access the related services, enabling them to move laterally or escalate privileges. Easily guessable passwords are often comprised of common words, seasons, months and/or years, and are sometimes combined with special characters. Additionally, phrases or names that are popular locally (such as the organization being tested or a local sports teams) may also be considered easily guessable.
The team sprayed common passwords against domain user accounts and obtained valid credentials for standard domain users. (See the Attack Path 3 section.) (Cracking was not necessary for this attack.)
Misconfigured ADCS Certificate Templates
High
Penetration Testing
The team identified a WebServer template configured to allow all authenticated users permission to change the properties of the template and obtain certificates for different users. The team exploited the template to acquire a certificate for a Domain Administrator account (see the Attack Path 2 section).
Unnecessary Network Services Enabled
High
Penetration Testing
Malicious actors can exploit security vulnerabilities and misconfigurations in network services, especially legacy services.
The assessment team identified legacy name resolution protocols (e.g., NetBIOS, LLMNR, mDNS) enabled in the network, and abused LLMNR to capture NTLMv2 hashes, which they then cracked and used for domain access. (See the Attack Path 1 section.)
The team also identified an ADCS server with web enrollment enabled and leveraged it to compromise the domain through coercion and relaying. (See Attack Path 3 section.)
Additionally, the team identified hosts with WebClient and Spooler services, which are often abused by malicious actors to coerce authentication.
Elevated Service Account Privileges
High
Penetration Testing
Applications often require user accounts to operate. These user accounts, which are known as service accounts, often require elevated privileges. If an application or service running with a service account is compromised, an actor may have the same privileges and access as the service account.
The CISA team identified a service account with Domain Administrator privileges and used it to access the domain after cracking its password (See the Attack Path 1 section).
SMB Signing Not Enabled
High
Penetration Testing
The CISA team identified several systems on the organization’s network that do not enforce SMB signing and exploited this for relayed authentication to obtain cleartext credentials for two domain administrator accounts.
Many off-the-shelf applications are released with built-in administrative accounts using predefined credentials that can often be found with a simple web search. Malicious actors with minimal technical knowledge can use these credentials to access the related services.
During testing, the CISA team identified multiple web interfaces with default administrator credentials and used default credentials for a printer interface to capture domain credentials of a non-privileged domain account. (See the Attack Path 2 section.)
In addition to the issues listed above, the team identified three High and seven Medium severity findings. These vulnerabilities and misconfigurations may allow a malicious actor to compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the tested environment. See Table 4 for a list and description of these findings.
Table 4: Additional Key Issues
Issue
Severity
Service
Description
Poor Credential Hygiene: Password Reuse for Administrator and User Accounts
High
Penetration Testing
Elevated password reuse is when an administrator uses the same password for their user and administrator accounts. If the user account password is compromised, it can be used to gain access to the administrative account.
The assessment team identified an instance where the same password was set for an admin user’s administrative account as well as their standard user account.
Poor Credential Hygiene: Password Reuse for Administrator Accounts
Medium
Penetration Testing
If administrator passwords are the same for various administrator accounts, malicious actors can use the password to access all systems that share this credential after compromising one account.
The assessment team found multiple instances of local administrator accounts across various systems using the same password.
Poor Patch Management: Out-of-Date Software
High
Penetration Testing
Patches and updates are released to address existing and emerging security vulnerabilities, and failure to apply the latest leaves systems open to attack with publicly available exploits. (The risk presented by missing patches and updates depends on the severity of the vulnerability).
The assessment team identified several unpatched systems including instances of CVE-2019-0708 (known as “BlueKeep”) and EternalBlue.
The team was unable to successfully compromise the systems with BlueKeep, but they did exploit EternalBlue on a server to implant a shell on a server with local SYSTEM privileges (see the Attack Path 5 section).
Poor Patch Management: Unsupported OS or Application
High
Penetration Testing
Using software or hardware that is no longer supported by the vendor poses a significant security risk because new and existing vulnerabilities are no longer patched). There is no way to address security vulnerabilities on these devices to ensure that they are secure. The overall security posture of the entire network is at risk because an attacker can target these devices to establish an initial foothold into the network.
The assessment team identified end-of-life (EOL) Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2008 and Windows 5.1.
Use of Weak Authentication Measures
Medium
Penetration Testing
Applications may have weak or broken mechanisms to verify user identity before granting user access to protected functionalities. Malicious actors can exploit these to bypass authentication and gain access to use application resources and functionality.
The assessment team abused the Cisco Smart Install protocol to obtain configuration files for several Cisco devices on the organization’s network. These files contained encrypted Cisco passwords. (The CISA team was unable to crack these passwords within the assessment timeframe.)
PII Disclosure
Medium
Penetration Testing
The assessment team identified an unencrypted Excel file containing PII on a file share.
Hosts with Unconstrained Delegation Enabled Unnecessarily
Medium
Penetration Testing
The CISA team identified two systems that appeared to be configured with Unconstrained Delegation enabled. Hosts with Unconstrained Delegation enabled store the Kerberos TGTs of all users that authenticate to that host, enabling actors to steal service tickets or compromise krbtgt accounts and perform golden ticket or silver ticket attacks.
Although the assessment team was unable to fully exploit this configuration because they lost access to one of the vulnerable hosts, it could have led to domain compromise under the right circumstances.
Cleartext Password Disclosure
Medium
Penetration Testing
Storing passwords in cleartext is a security risk because malicious actors with access to these files can use them.
The assessment team identified several unencrypted files on a file share containing passwords for various personal and organizational accounts.
Insecure File Shares
Medium
Penetration Testing
Access to sensitive data (e.g., data related to business functions, IT functions, and/or personnel) should be restricted to only certain authenticated and authorized users.
The assessment team found an unsecured directory on a file share with sensitive IT information. The directory was accessible to all users in the domain group. Malicious actors with user privileges could access and/or exfiltrate this data.
Additional Issues
The CISA team identified one Informational severity within the organization’s networks and systems. These issues may allow a malicious actor to compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the tested environment, but are not readily exploitable. The information provided is to encourage the stakeholder to investigate these issues further to adjust their environments or eliminate certain aspects as needed, but the urgency is low.
Table 5: Informational Issues That CISA Team Noted
Issue
Severity
Service
Description
Overly Permissive Accounts
Informational
Penetration Testing
Account privileges are intended to control user access to host or application resources to limit access to sensitive information in support of a least-privilege security model. When user (or other) accounts have high privileges, users can see and/or do things they normally should not, and malicious actors can exploit this to access host and application resources.
The assessment team identified Active Directory objects where the Human Resources group appeared to be part of the privileged Account Operators group. This may have provided elevated privileges to accounts in the Human Resources group. (The CISA team was unable to validate and demonstrate the potential impact of this relationship within the assessment period).
Noted Strengths
The CISA team noted the following business, technical, and administrative components that enhanced the network security posture of the tested environment:
The organization’s network was found to have several strong, security-oriented characteristics such as:
Effective antivirus software;
Endpoint detection and response capabilities;
Good policies and best practices for protecting users from malicious files including not allowing users to mount ISO files;
Minimal external attack surface, limiting an adversary’s ability to leverage external vulnerabilities to gain initial access to the organization’s networks and systems;
Strong wireless protocols;
And network segmentation.
The organization’s security also demonstrated their ability to detect some of the CISA team’s actions throughout testing and overall situational awareness through the use of logs and alerts.
The organization used MFA for cloud accounts. The assessment team obtained cloud credentials via a phishing campaign but was unable to use them because of MFA prompts.
MITIGATIONS
Network Defenders
CISA recommends HPH Sector and other critical infrastructure organizations implement the mitigations in Table 6 to mitigate the issues listed in the Findings section of this advisory. These mitigations align with the Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals (CPGs) developed by CISA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The CPGs provide a minimum set of practices and protections that CISA and NIST recommend all organizations implement. CISA and NIST based the CPGs on existing cybersecurity frameworks and guidance to protect against the most common and impactful threats, tactics, techniques, and procedures. Visit CISA’s Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals for more information on the CPGs, including additional recommended baseline protections.
Table 6: Recommendations to Mitigate Identified Issues
Follow National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST) guidelineswhen creating password policies to enforce use of “strong” passwords that cannot be cracked [CPG 2.B].[11] Consider using password managers to generate and store passwords.
Use “strong” passphrases for private keys to make cracking resource intensive [CPG 2.B]. Do not store credentials within the registry in Windows systems. Establish an organizational policy that prohibits password storage in files.
Ensure adequate password length (ideally 15+ characters) and complexity requirements for Windows service accounts and implement passwords with periodic expiration on these accounts [CPG 2.B]. Use Managed Service Accounts, when possible, to manage service account passwords automatically.
Poor Credential Hygiene: Guessable Credentials
Do not reuse local administrator account passwords across systems. Ensure that passwords are “strong” and unique [CPG 2.C].
Use phishing-resistant multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all administrative access, including domain administrative access [CPG 2.H]. If an organization that uses mobile push-notification-based MFA is unable to implement phishing-resistant MFA, use number matching to mitigate MFA fatigue. For more information, see CISA fact sheets on Implementing Phishing-Resistant MFA and Implementing Number Matching in MFA Applications.
Misconfigured ADCS Certificate Templates
Restrict enrollment rights in templates to only those users or groups that require it. Remove the Enrollee Supplies Subject flag from templates if it is not necessary or enforce manager approval if required. Consider removing Write Owner, Write DACL and Write Property permissions from low-privilege groups, such as Authenticated Users where those permissions are not needed.
Unnecessary Network Services Enabled
Ensure that only ports, protocols, and services with validated business needs are running on each system. Disable deprecated protocols (including NetBIOS, LLMNR, and mDNS) on the network that are not strictly necessary for business functions, or limit the systems and services that use the protocol, where possible [CPG 2.W].
Disable theWebClientand Spooler services where possible to minimize risk of coerced authentication.
Disable ADCS web-enrollment services. If this service cannot be disabled, disable NTLM authentication to prevent malicious actors from performing NTLM relay attacks or abusing the Spooler and WebClient services to coerce and relay authentication to the web-enrollment service.
Elevated Service Account Privileges
Run daemon applications using a non-Administrator account when appropriate.
Configure Service accounts with only the permissions necessary for the services they operate.
To mitigate Kerberoasting attacks, use AES or stronger encryption instead of RC4 for Kerberos hashes [CPG 2.K]. RC4 is considered weak encryption.
SMB Signing Not Enabled
Require SMB signing for both SMB client and server on all systems to prevent certain adversary-in-the-middle and pass-the-hash attacks. See Microsoft’s Overview of Server Message Block signing for more information.
Verify the implementation of appropriate hardening measures, and change, remove, or deactivate all default credentials [CPG 2.A].
Before deploying any new devices in a networked environment, change all default passwords for applications, operating systems, routers, firewalls, wireless access points, and other systems to have values consistent with administration-level accounts [CPG 2.A].
Poor Credential Hygiene: Password Reuse for Administrator and User Accounts
Discontinue reuse or sharing of administrative credentials among user/administrative accounts [CPG 2.C].
Use unique credentials across workstations, when possible, in accordance with applicable federal standards, industry best practices, and/or agency-defined requirements.
Train users, especially privileged users, against password reuse [CPG 2.I].
Poor Credential Hygiene: Password Reuse for Administrator Accounts
Discontinue reuse or sharing of administrative credentials among systems [CPG 2.C]. When possible, use unique credentials across all workstations in accordance with applicable federal standards, industry best practices, and/or agency-defined requirements.
Implement a security awareness program that focuses on the methods commonly used in intrusions that can be blocked through individual action [CPG 2.I].
Implement Local Administrator Password Solution (LAPS) where possible if your OS is older than Windows Server 2019 and Windows 10 as these versions do not have LAPS built in. Note: The authoring organizations recommend organizations upgrade to Windows Server 2019 and Windows 10 or greater.
Poor Patch Management: Out-of-Date Software
Enforce consistent patch management across all systems and hosts within the network environment [CPG 1.E].
Where patching is not possible due to limitations, implement network segregation controls [CPG 2.F] to limit exposure of the vulnerable system or host.
Consider deploying automated patch management tools and software update tools for operating system and software/applications on all systems for which such tools are available and safe.
Poor Patch Management: Unsupported OS or Application
Evaluate the use of unsupported hardware and software and discontinue where possible. If discontinuing the use of unsupported hardware and software is not possible, implement additional network protections to mitigate the risk.
Use of Weak Authentication Measures
Require phishing-resistant MFA for all user accounts that have access to sensitive data or systems. If MFA is not possible, it is recommended to, at a minimum, configure a more secure password policy by aligning with guidelines put forth by trusted entities such as NIST [CPG 2.H].
PII Disclosure
Implement a process to review files and systems for insecure handling of PII [CPG 2.L]. Properly secure or remove the information. Conduct periodic scans of server machines using automated tools to determine whether sensitive data (e.g., personally identifiable information, health, credit card, or classified information) is present on the system in cleartext.
Encrypt PII and other sensitive data, and train users who handle sensitive data to utilize best practices for encrypting data and storing it securely. If sensitive data must be stored on shares or other locations, restrict access to these locations as much as possible through access controls and network segmentation [CPG 2.F, 2.K, 2.L].
Hosts with Unconstrained Delegation Enabled Unnecessarily
RemoveUnconstrained Delegationfrom all servers. If Unconstrained Delegation functionality is required, upgrade operating systems and applications to leverage other approaches (e.g., configure Constrained Delegation, enable the Account is sensitive and cannot be delegated option) or explore whether systems can be retired or further isolated from the enterprise. CISA recommends Windows Server 2019 or greater.
Cleartext Password Disclosure
Implement a review process for files and systems to look for cleartext account credentials. When credentials are found, remove or change them to maintain security [CPG 2.L].
Conduct periodic scans of server machines using automated tools to determine whether sensitive data (e.g., personally identifiable information, health, credit card, or classified information) is present on the system in cleartext. Consider implementing a secure password manager solution in cases where passwords need to be stored [CPG 2.L].
Insecure File Shares
Restrict access to file shares containing sensitive data to only certain authenticated and authorized users [CPG 2.L].
Additionally, CISA recommends that HPH sector organizations implement the following strategies to mitigate cyber threats:
Mitigation Strategy #1 Asset Management and Security:
CISA recommends that HPH sector organizations implement and maintain an asset management policy to reduce the risk of exposing vulnerabilities, devices, or services that could be exploited by threat actors to gain unauthorized access, steal sensitive data, or disrupt critical services. The focus areas for this mitigation strategy include asset management and asset security, addressing asset inventory, procurement, decommissioning, and network segmentation as they relate to hardware, software, and data assets.
Mitigation Strategy #2 Identity Management and Device Security:
CISA recommends entities secure their devices and digital accounts and manage their online access to protect sensitive data and PII/PHI from compromise. The focus areas for this mitigation strategy include email security, phising prevention, access management, password policies, data protection and loss prevention, and device logs and monitoring solutions.
Mitigation Strategy #3 Vulnerability, Patch, and Configuration Management:
CISA recommends entities mitigate known vulnerabilities and establish secure configuration baselines to reduce the likelihood of threat actors exploiting known vulnerabilities to breach organizational networks. The focus areas for this mitigation strategy include vulnerability and patch Management, and configuration and change management.
The above mitigations apply to HPH sector and other critical infrastructure organizations with on-premises or hybrid environments. Recognizing that insecure software is the root cause of the majority of these flaws, and that the responsibility should not be on the end user, CISA urges software manufacturers to implement the following to reduce the prevalence of misconfigurations, weak passwords, and other weaknesses identified and exploited through the assessment team:
Embed security into product architecture throughout theentire software development lifecycle (SDLC).
Eliminate default passwords. Do not provide software with default passwords. To eliminate default passwords, require administrators set a “strong” password [CPG 2.B] during installation and configuration.
Create secure configuration templates. Provide configuration templates with certain safe settings based on an organization’s risk appetite (e.g., low, medium, and high security templates). Support these templates with hardening guides based on the risks the manufacturer has identified. The default configuration should be a secure one, and organizations should need to opt in if they desire a less secure configuration.
Design products so that the compromise of a single security control does not result in compromise of the entire system. For example, narrowly provision user privileges by default and employ ACLs to reduce the impact of a compromised account. This will make it more difficult for a malicious cyber actor to escalate privileges and move laterally.
These mitigations align with tactics provided in the joint guide Shifting the Balance of Cybersecurity Risk: Principles and Approaches for Secure by Design Software. CISA urges software manufacturers to take ownership of improving the security outcomes of their customers by applying these and other secure by design tactics. By using secure by design tactics, software manufacturers can make their product lines secure “out of the box” without requiring customers to spend additional resources making configuration changes, purchasing security software and logs, monitoring, and making routine updates.
In addition to applying the listed mitigations, CISA recommends exercising, testing, and validating your organization’s security program against the threat behaviors mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK for Enterprise framework in this advisory. CISA recommends testing your existing security controls inventory to assess how they perform against the ATT&CK techniques described in this advisory.
To get started:
Select an ATT&CK technique described in this advisory (see Tables 7 – 16).
Align your security technologies against the technique.
Test your technologies against the technique.
Analyze your detection and prevention technologies’ performance.
Repeat the process for all security technologies to obtain a set of comprehensive performance data.
Tune your security program, including people, processes, and technologies, based on the data generated by this process.
CISA recommends continually testing your security program, at scale, in a production environment to ensure optimal performance against the MITRE ATT&CK techniques identified in this advisory.
The CISA team did identify default credentials for multiple web interfaces during web application testing and used default printer credentials while penetration testing.
The CISA team accessed a virtual machine interface enabling them to modify, power off, and/or delete critical virtual machines including domain controllers, file servers, and servers.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell
The CISA team modified the “Save as file” configuration, to use File Transfer Protocol (FTP) instead of Server Message Block (SMB) and changed the Server Name and Network Path to point to a CISA-controlled machine running Responder.
The CISA team used the hash to authenticate to the domain controller and validated Domain Administrator privileges, demonstrating compromise of the domain.
The CISA team used a tool called CrackMapExec to spray easily guessable passwords across all domain accounts, giving them two sets of valid credentials.
The CISA team assessed that with ACCOUNT 1, they could use it to modify, power off, and/or delete critical virtual machines, including domain controllers and file servers.
