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CHINESE APT GELSEMIUM DEPLOYS 'WOLFSBANE' LINUX VARIANTCHINESE APT GELSEMIUM
DEPLOYS 'WOLFSBANE' LINUX VARIANT

In a sign of the times, a backdoor malware whose ancestors date back to 2005 has
morphed to target Linux systems.

Nate Nelson, Contributing Writer

November 21, 2024

3 Min Read
Source: Imagebroker via Alamy Stock Photo


Two well-documented Chinese backdoors have recently been modified to operate on
Linux systems.

The advanced persistent threat (APT) "Gelsemium" is a decade old now, and the
new malware tied to the group, Wolfsbane and Firewood, can trace their lineage
back to 2005. Throughout its history, Gelsemium has focused on information
gathering from Windows systems. Now, it has adjusted its tooling to operate just
as effectively in Linux environments.

This, experts say, is merely the latest manifestation of a long-brewing trend.

"The Linux malware landscape is certainly accelerating," says Jason Soroko,
senior fellow at Sectigo. "The increase does make sense, as organizations have
heavily adopted Linux for their back office server needs, both on premises and
in the cloud. Adversaries are developing cross-platform malware to maximize
their reach."




THE WOLFSBANE & FIREWOOD BACKDOORS

The first public sample of the first new backdoor, dubbed Wolsbane, was uploaded
to VirusTotal on March 6, 2023, from Taiwan, with later uploads coming from the
Philippines and Singapore (historically, Gelsemium has targeted entities in the
Middle East and East Asia).

Contextual evidence suggests that the malware's authors have been exploiting
vulnerabilities in Java Web applications to access public-facing Apache Tomcat
servers. And a deeper look inside reveals unmistakable overlaps with
Gelsevirine, a Windows backdoor known to be used by Gelsemium. In essence, the
Wolfsbane malware was a Linux port of Gelsevirine, featuring a modified Beurk
Experimental Unix RootKit to hide its various malicious activities.

Alongside Wolfsbane, though not definitively attributable to Gelsemium, was a
second Linux-ported backdoor, Firewood. An addition to its varied and typical
backdoor capabilities, it possesses a kernel-level rootkit. 

Most interestingly, Firewood appears to be the latest evolution of "Project
Wood," a phylum of a backdoor that traces back generations to a program first
compiled in January 2005. The latest manifestation of Project Wood before
Firewood, NSPX30, was reported earlier this year.


WHAT EXPLAINS THE SURGE IN LINUX CYBER THREATS?

Cyber threats rise across the board every year, but the particular rise in
Linux-based threats stands out. 

Since at least 2020, vendors have tracked double- and triple-digit
year-over-year increases in Linux attacks. In its annual "Global Threat Report,"
Elastic Security has regularly found that the Linux threat landscape vastly
outpaces that of macOS, more closely resembling Windows in terms of sheer volume
of attacks. In 2023, for example, it found that 54% of endpoint attacks affected
Linux-based devices, compared with just 39% for Windows.

Over the past 12 months, around 32% of malware infections have targeted Linux,
according to Jake King, Elastic's head of threat and security intelligence.
"While steadily increasing, we are seeing greater volumes of attacks and, in
some cases, with greater levels of sophistication. The XZ/Liblzma backdoor
discovered by researchers earlier this year shows the desire of adversaries to
compromise Linux hosts, likely for a variety of reasons, growing in
sophistication to supply chain compromise," he says.

The rising threats to Linux may be attributable to an increasing adoption of
Linux in enterprise environments, as Soroko alluded to, or the generally
improving state of Windows security — the explanation ESET went with in its blog
post — or an explanation even simpler.

"One of the reasons for growing observations can always be targeted to
adversarial focus changing, but it is also likely that security tooling and
telemetry for Linux hosts are improving at a pace whereby attacks are identified
earlier, with a greater level of context," King suggests. For example, "A
growing trend for threat observations this year was Impaired Defenses for Linux,
showing that adversaries are specifically looking to bypass security tools
native to Linux or disable third-party security tools. This is important, as it
shows we're exposing many attacks that would have previously gone undetected
years ago."




ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nate Nelson, Contributing Writer



Nate Nelson is a freelance writer based in New York City. Formerly a reporter at
Threatpost, he contributes to a number of cybersecurity blogs and podcasts. He
writes "Malicious Life" -- an award-winning Top 20 tech podcast on Apple and
Spotify -- and hosts every other episode, featuring interviews with leading
voices in security. He also co-hosts "The Industrial Security Podcast," the most
popular show in its field.

See more from Nate Nelson, Contributing Writer
Keep up with the latest cybersecurity threats, newly discovered vulnerabilities,
data breach information, and emerging trends. Delivered daily or weekly right to
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