Since 2019, Forest Blizzard has used a custom post-compromise tool to exploit a vulnerability in the Windows Print Spooler service that allows elevated permissions. Microsoft has issued a security update addressing this vulnerability as CVE-2022-38028.
Microsoft recently uncovered an attack that exploits new critical vulnerabilities in OpenMetadata to gain access to Kubernetes workloads and leverage them for cryptomining activity.
Microsoft, in collaboration with OpenAI, is publishing research on emerging threats in the age of AI, focusing on identified activity associated with known threat actors Forest Blizzard, Emerald Sleet, Crimson Sandstorm, and others. The observed activity includes prompt-injections, attempted misuse of large language models (LLM), and fraud.
The Microsoft security team detected a nation-state attack on our corporate systems on January 12, 2024, and immediately activated our response process to investigate, disrupt malicious activity, mitigate the attack, and deny the threat actor further access.
Since November 2023, Microsoft has observed a distinct subset of Mint Sandstorm (PHOSPHORUS) targeting high-profile individuals working on Middle Eastern affairs at universities and research organizations in Belgium, France, Gaza, Israel, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Since mid-November 2023, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed threat actors, including financially motivated actors like Storm-0569, Storm-1113, Sangria Tempest, and Storm-1674, utilizing the ms-appinstaller URI scheme (App Installer) to distribute malware.
Microsoft Threat Intelligence continues to track and disrupt malicious activity attributed to a Russian state-sponsored actor we track as Star Blizzard, who has continuously improved their detection evasion capabilities while remaining focused on email credential theft against targets.
Microsoft has uncovered a supply chain attack by the threat actor Diamond Sleet (ZINC) involving a malicious variant of an application developed by CyberLink Corp. This malicious file is a legitimate CyberLink application installer that has been modified to include malicious code that downloads, decrypts, and loads a second-stage payload.
At the CYBERWARCON 2023 conference, Microsoft and LinkedIn analysts are presenting several sessions detailing analysis across multiple sets of threat actors and related activity, demonstrating Microsoft Threat Intelligence’s ongoing efforts to track threat actors, protect customers, and share information with the wider security community.
Microsoft has been tracking activity related to the financially motivated threat actor Octo Tempest, whose evolving campaigns represent a growing concern for many organizations across multiple industries.
