ESET Analysis
ESET Analysis has performed a complete technical evaluation of Gamaredon’s toolset used to conduct its cyberespionage actions targeted in Ukraine
26 Sep 2024
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5 min. learn
The warfare in Ukraine, which began in February 2014 and intensified with Russia’s invasion of the nation on February 24th, 2022, exemplifies a multifaceted warfare, rife with disinformation campaigns and cyberwarfare. All through these years, ESET Analysis has revealed a number of high-profile cyberattacks performed by Russia-aligned superior persistent menace (APT) teams concentrating on Ukrainian entities and Ukrainian audio system, analyzed varied operations, and stored observe of a number of APT teams specializing in this area due to the warfare.
On this analysis, we determined to look at the operations of Gamaredon, the Russia-aligned group that has been energetic since not less than 2013 and is presently essentially the most engaged APT group in Ukraine. The depth of the bodily battle has noticeably elevated since 2022, nevertheless it’s value noting that the extent of exercise from Gamaredon has remained constant – the group has been methodically deploying its malicious instruments in opposition to its targets since nicely earlier than the invasion started.
We have now analyzed 1000’s of samples whereas conducting a complete technical evaluation of Gamaredon’s toolset used to conduct its cyberespionage actions in 2022 and 2023; we reveal the outcomes of our evaluation in our white paper, which you’ll be able to learn in full right here:
Within the white paper, we share particulars about Gamaredon’s ever-changing obfuscation tips and quite a few strategies used for bypassing domain-based blocking. These techniques pose a big problem to monitoring efforts, as they make it tougher for techniques to mechanically detect and block the group’s instruments. Nonetheless, throughout our analysis, we managed to determine and perceive these techniques, and maintain observe of Gamaredon’s actions. We additionally describe the instruments which are most prevalent or fascinating in another manner so as to shed extra gentle on the relationships that exist among the many instruments and to assist create an even bigger image of the instruments’ ecosystem.
Victimology and group background
Gamaredon has been attributed by the Safety Service of Ukraine (SSU) to the 18th Middle of Info Safety of the FSB, working out of occupied Crimea. We imagine this group to be collaborating with one other menace actor that we found and named InvisiMole.
As evidenced over time by ESET telemetry, in a number of studies from CERT-UA, and from different official Ukrainian our bodies, the vast majority of Gamaredon’s assaults are directed in opposition to Ukrainian governmental establishments. To our shock, in April 2022 and February 2023, we noticed just a few makes an attempt to compromise targets in a number of NATO nations, specifically Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland, however no profitable breaches had been noticed.
Between November 1st, 2022 and December 31st 2023, we noticed greater than a thousand distinctive machines in Ukraine that had been attacked by Gamaredon. The seven-day shifting common of each day additions is visualized in Determine 1.
Noisy and reckless, however nonetheless harmful
To compromise new victims, Gamaredon conducts spearphishing campaigns after which makes use of its customized malware to weaponize Phrase paperwork and USB drives accessible to the preliminary sufferer and which are anticipated to be shared with additional potential victims.
In accordance with our long-term observations, Gamaredon, in contrast to most APT teams, doesn’t attempt to be stealthy and stay hidden so long as potential by utilizing novel strategies when conducting cyberespionage operations, however slightly the operators are reckless and don’t thoughts being found by defenders throughout their operations. Although they don’t care a lot about being noisy, they apparently put in loads of effort to keep away from being blocked by safety merchandise and check out very exhausting to take care of entry to compromised techniques.
Sometimes, Gamaredon makes an attempt to protect its entry by deploying a number of easy downloaders or backdoors concurrently. The shortage of sophistication of Gamaredon instruments is compensated by frequent updates and use of commonly altering obfuscation.
A shift in the direction of VBScript and PowerShell
Gamaredon’s toolset has undergone a number of modifications over time. In 2022, the group slowly began to shift towards using VBScript and PowerShell in tandem, and Gamaredon nearly utterly ditched using SFX archives, which had been its major tactic beforehand. Throughout 2023, Gamaredon notably improved its cyberespionage capabilities and developed a number of new instruments in PowerShell, with the give attention to stealing helpful knowledge, for instance from internet purposes operating inside web browsers, e mail shoppers, and prompt messaging purposes comparable to Sign and Telegram.
Nevertheless, PteroBleed, an infostealer we found in August 2023, additionally focuses on stealing knowledge associated to a Ukrainian army system and from a webmail service utilized by a Ukrainian governmental establishment. The timeline of recent instruments launched in 2022 and 2023 is proven in Determine 2; aside from PteroScreen, all of them had been found by ESET Analysis.
Typically, we will categorize Gamaredon’s toolset into downloaders, droppers, weaponizers, stealers, backdoors, and advert hoc instruments. The group makes use of a mix of general-purpose and devoted downloaders to ship payloads. Droppers are used to ship varied VBScript payloads; weaponizers alter properties of present information or create new information on related USB drives, and stealers exfiltrate particular information from the file system. Moreover, backdoors function distant shells, and advert hoc instruments carry out particular capabilities, like a reverse SOCKS proxy or payload supply utilizing the authentic command line program rclone.
Quick switching of C&C IP addresses and domains
Our evaluation additionally sheds gentle on the group’s community infrastructure. Gamaredon makes use of a method referred to as quick flux DNS – often altering its command and management (C&C) servers’ IP addresses, often a number of instances per day, to keep away from IP-based blocking. The group additionally often registers and updates many new C&C domains to keep away from domain-based blocking, primarily utilizing .ru because the top-level area (TLD).
Gamaredon has additionally demonstrated resourcefulness by using varied strategies to evade network-based detections, leveraging third-party providers comparable to Telegram, Cloudflare, and ngrok.
Regardless of the relative simplicity of its instruments, Gamaredon’s aggressive strategy and persistence make it a big menace. Given the continued warfare within the area, we anticipate Gamaredon to proceed in its give attention to Ukraine.
For a extra detailed evaluation and technical breakdown of Gamaredon’s instruments and actions, you may entry the total ESET Analysis white paper right here.
A complete listing of indicators of compromise (IoCs) may be present in our GitHub repository and the Gamaredon white paper.
