Credential harvesters in the cloud. [Research Saturday]
Nov 16, 2024
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Blake Darché, Head of Cloudforce One at Cloudflare, dives into the murky world of the threat actor known as SloppyLemming. He reveals their extensive espionage campaigns targeting critical sectors in South Asia, employing tactics like credential harvesting and malware delivery. Despite their advanced methods, SloppyLemming's poor operational security has provided investigators with crucial insights. Darché emphasizes the importance of collaboration and robust defenses in mitigating these evolving cyber threats.
Sloppy Lemming targets South and East Asia's government and military sectors using credential harvesting and phishing techniques for espionage.
Poor operational security by Sloppy Lemming has provided investigators with crucial insights into their infrastructure and tool usage for better detection.
Deep dives
Overview of Sloppy Lemming Operations
Sloppy Lemming is a threat actor based in Asia that predominantly targets government and military sectors in South and East Asia, particularly Pakistan. Their espionage campaigns aim to extract sensitive information from military and government organizations across the Asia-Pacific region. By employing multi-cloud strategies, they make their operations difficult to trace, utilizing various cloud service providers to mask their activities. This approach complicates detection and response efforts from cybersecurity defenders, allowing Sloppy Lemming to operate under the radar.
Credential Harvesting Techniques
The threat actor's credential harvesting process involves sending phishing emails that masquerade as communications from IT professionals, luring users to click on malicious links. Once users are redirected to a fake credential harvesting page, they unknowingly provide their login information, which Sloppy Lemming then stores for future account access. This method can target hundreds of users simultaneously, with the initial phishing click serving as the entry point for many cyber attacks. The group's reliance on such phishing techniques emphasizes the importance of cybersecurity awareness among potential targets.
Mitigation Strategies and Cybersecurity Recommendations
To counter threats from Sloppy Lemming, organizations must prioritize patching known vulnerabilities, like the CVE-2023-38 exploit, to fortify their defenses against these attacks. Implementing robust email security measures is also crucial to intercept phishing attempts before they reach users. Additionally, the necessity for critical infrastructure entities and their contractors to understand their vulnerabilities and the potential attack vectors is vital for maintaining network security. Collaboration among different cybersecurity stakeholders, such as cloud service providers, is essential to enhance defenses and disrupt threat actors effectively.
This week we are joined by, Blake Darché, Head of Cloudforce One at Cloudflare, to discuss their work on "Unraveling SloppyLemming’s Operations Across South Asia." Cloudforce One's investigation into the advanced threat actor "SloppyLemming" reveals an extensive espionage campaign targeting South and East Asia, with a focus on Pakistan's government, defense, telecommunications, and energy sectors.
Leveraging multiple cloud service providers, SloppyLemming employs tactics like credential harvesting, malware delivery, and command-and-control (C2) operations, often relying on open-source adversary emulation tools like Cobalt Strike. Despite its activities, the actor's poor operational security (OPSEC) has allowed investigators to gain valuable insights into its infrastructure and tooling.