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Peach Sandstorm deploys new custom Tickler malware in long-running intelligence gathering operations 

Between April and July 2024, Microsoft observed Iranian state-sponsored threat actor Peach Sandstorm deploying a new custom multi-stage backdoor, which we named Tickler. Tickler has been used in attacks against targets in the satellite, communications equipment, oil and gas, as well as federal and state government sectors in the United States and the United Arab […]

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Chained for attack: OpenVPN vulnerabilities discovered leading to RCE and LPE 

Microsoft researchers found multiple vulnerabilities in OpenVPN that could lead to an attack chain allowing remote code execution and local privilege escalation. This attack chain could enable attackers to gain full control over targeted endpoints, potentially resulting in data breaches, system compromise, and unauthorized access to sensitive information.

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Published
5 min read

How Microsoft and NIST are collaborating to advance the Zero Trust Implementation 

Both Microsoft and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) National Cyber security Center of Excellence (NCCoE) have translated the Zero Trust Architecture (ZTA) and Security Model into practical and actionable deployment. In this blog post, we explore details of their collaboration on a Zero Trust (ZT) implementation and what this learning pathway means for your organization.​​

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Ransomware operators exploit ESXi hypervisor vulnerability for mass encryption 

Microsoft Security researchers have observed a vulnerability used by various ransomware operators to get full administrative access to domain-joined ESXi hypervisors and encrypt the virtual machines running on them. The vulnerability involves creating a group called “ESX Admins” in Active Directory and adding an attacker-controlled user account to this group. This manipulation of the Active Directory group takes advantage of a privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2024-37085) in ESXi hypervisors that grants the added user full administrative access to the ESXi hypervisor. The vulnerability was fixed by VMware in their June release and ESXi administrators should install this security update.