www.darkreading.com Open in urlscan Pro
2606:4700::6811:7563  Public Scan

Form analysis
0 forms found in the DOM

Text Content

The Edge
DR Tech
Sections
Close
Back
Sections
Featured Sections
The Edge
Dark Reading Technology
Attacks / Breaches

Cloud

ICS/OT

Remote Workforce

Perimeter

Analytics
Security Monitoring

Security Monitoring
App Sec
Database Security

Database Security
Risk
Compliance

Compliance
Threat Intelligence

Endpoint
AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy

AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy
Vulnerabilities / Threats
Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management

Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management
Operations
Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People

Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People
Physical Security

IoT

Black Hat news
Omdia Research
Security Now
Events
Close
Back
Events
Events
 * Anatomy of a Data Breach - A Dark Reading June 22 Event
   
 * Black Hat USA - August 5-10 - Learn More
   

Webinars
 * Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
   May 09, 2023
 * Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk
   May 11, 2023

Resources
Close
Back
Resources
Dark Reading Library >
Webinars >
Reports >
Slideshows >
White Papers >
Partner Perspectives: Microsoft
Tech Library >

Newsletter

The Edge
DR Tech
Sections
Close
Back
Sections
Featured Sections
The Edge
Dark Reading Technology
Attacks / Breaches

Cloud

ICS/OT

Remote Workforce

Perimeter

Analytics
Security Monitoring

Security Monitoring
App Sec
Database Security

Database Security
Risk
Compliance

Compliance
Threat Intelligence

Endpoint
AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy

AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy
Vulnerabilities / Threats
Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management

Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management
Operations
Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People

Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People
Physical Security

IoT

Black Hat news
Omdia Research
Security Now
Events
Close
Back
Events
Events
 * Anatomy of a Data Breach - A Dark Reading June 22 Event
   
 * Black Hat USA - August 5-10 - Learn More
   

Webinars
 * Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
   May 09, 2023
 * Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk
   May 11, 2023

Resources
Close
Back
Resources
Dark Reading Library >
Webinars >
Reports >
Slideshows >
White Papers >
Partner Perspectives: Microsoft
Tech Library >
The Edge
DR Tech
Sections
Close
Back
Sections
Featured Sections
The Edge
Dark Reading Technology
Attacks / Breaches

Cloud

ICS/OT

Remote Workforce

Perimeter

Analytics
Security Monitoring

Security Monitoring
App Sec
Database Security

Database Security
Risk
Compliance

Compliance
Threat Intelligence

Endpoint
AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy

AuthenticationMobile SecurityPrivacy
Vulnerabilities / Threats
Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management

Advanced ThreatsInsider ThreatsVulnerability Management
Operations
Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People

Identity & Access ManagementCareers & People
Physical Security

IoT

Black Hat news
Omdia Research
Security Now
Events
Close
Back
Events
Events
 * Anatomy of a Data Breach - A Dark Reading June 22 Event
   
 * Black Hat USA - August 5-10 - Learn More
   

Webinars
 * Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
   May 09, 2023
 * Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk
   May 11, 2023

Resources
Close
Back
Resources
Dark Reading Library >
Webinars >
Reports >
Slideshows >
White Papers >
Partner Perspectives: Microsoft
Tech Library >

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Newsletter
SEARCH
A minimum of 3 characters are required to be typed in the search bar in order to
perform a search.




Announcements
 1. 
 2. 
 3. 

Event
How to Launch a Threat Hunting Program | Webinar <REGISTER>
Event
How to Accelerate XDR Outcomes: Bridging the Gap Between Network and Endpoint |
Webinar <REGISTER>
Report
Black Hat USA 2022 Attendee Report | Supply Chain & Cloud Security Risks Are Top
of Mind | <READ IT NOW>
PreviousNext

Attacks/Breaches

6 MIN READ

News



FIREEYE IDENTIFIES KILLSWITCH FOR SOLARWINDS MALWARE AS VICTIMS SCRAMBLE TO
RESPOND

White House National Security Council establishes unified group to coordinate
response across federal agencies to the threat.
Jai Vijayan
Contributing Writer, Dark Reading
December 16, 2020
PDF


FireEye, which last Sunday disclosed a compromise at network management software
vendor SolarWinds that allowed an unknown attacker to distribute malware to
potentially thousands of organizations, has identified a killswitch that it says
would prevent the malware from operating on infected networks.



But in networks where the attackers might have already deployed additional
persistence mechanisms, the killswitch will not remove the threat from victim
networks, according to the security vendor.

Related Content:

Concerns Run High as More Details of SolarWinds Hack Emerge

Building an Effective Cybersecurity Incident Response Team

FireEye on Sunday said that an investigation it was conducting into a breach of
its own network last week uncovered a threat actor widely distributing a
backdoor dubbed SUNBURST by hiding it in legitimate updates of SolarWinds' Orion
network management technology.

SUNBURST (SolarWinds.Orion.Core.BusinessLayer dot dll) is a sort of first-stage
Trojan that the attackers were using to drop additional payloads for escalating
privileges, lateral movement, and data theft on infected networks,
FireEye explained. The stealth, planning, and precision with which the attack
was executed had all the hallmarks of a nation state-backed actor, the vendor
said. FireEye is currently tracking the threat actor as UNC2452, but says it has
not been able to identify whether and on whose behalf it might be operating. 

Security experts as well as some members of Congress who received classified
briefings on the attack, point to Russia as the likely perpetrator.




FireEye has released IoCs and other data to help organizations detect and
mitigate the threat. SolarWinds has released updates—including a hotfix
today—that it says addresses the issue in all impacted versions of its
technology. Since the breach was disclosed, Microsoft and numerous other vendors
of malware detection tools have also added signatures for the malicious DLL that
FireEye observed was being used to distribute SUNBURST.

An Effective Killswitch Under Some Circumstances

A FireEye spokesperson Wednesday said the company's analysis of SUNBURST showed
the malware could be prevented from operating under the right conditions.
"Depending on the IP address returned when the malware resolves avsvmcloud dot
com under certain conditions, the malware would terminate itself and prevent
further execution. FireEye collaborated with GoDaddy and Microsoft to deactivate
SUNBURST infections," the spokesperson said.

According to FireEye, the killswitch is effective against new and previous
SUNBURST deployments that might be still beaconing out to avsvmcloud dot com,
the location of the malware's command and control server. "However, in the
intrusions FireEye has seen, this actor moved quickly to establish additional
persistent mechanisms to access to victim networks beyond the SUNBURST
backdoor."



In these situations, the killswitch would not boot the threat actor out of an
infected network. But it could make life harder for them to use already
distributed versions of SUNBURST, FireEye said.

News of the killswitch comes amid high concerns over the potential scope and
impact of the SolarWinds intrusion, which FireEye discovered when investigating
a breach of its own network last week.

Obama-era Presidential Directive

On Tuesday, the White House National Security Council (NSC) announced that a
Unified Coordination Group (UCG) had been established to ensure a coordinated
federal agency response to the threat—as prescribed by PPD-41 an Obama-era
directive. The PPD-41 process "facilitates continuous and comprehensive
coordination for whole-of-government efforts to identify, mitigate, remediate,
and respond to this incident," the NSC said. Earlier on Monday, the DHS's
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a rare emergency
directive that ordered all federal civilian agencies to immediately power off
and disconnect instances of SolarWinds Orion, the network management product
that the attacker used to distribute the malware.

A lot of the concern has to do with the potential scope and impact of the
breach. SolarWinds supplies network management technology to most federal
agencies, all five branches of the military, and almost all Fortune 500
companies, in addition to thousands of managed services provides.

The company's Orion network management tool provides SolarWinds with access deep
into some of the biggest, most sensitive networks in the world. Many believe
that by poisoning legitimate Orion updates with SUNBURST malware, the attackers
have managed to gain what some refer to as "God-mode access" on the compromised
networks. Among those believed impacted in the breach are federal agencies like
the US Treasury Department, Homeland Security, Justice Department, and State
Department.

Researchers from Huntress Labs, which earlier this year validated a zero-day
exploit involving another SolarWinds technology called N-Central on Wednesday,
said they had compiled a list of more than 4,000 domains and subdomains tied to
the poisoned DLL. Huntress Labs' analysis of available data showed the
backdoored DLL to be present across 500,000 systems, but only within the Orion
product.

According to the vendor, the malicious DLL can be present in three specific
SolarWinds programs and 12 distinct locations on a computer filesystem. However,
the presence of the DLL alone does not indicate a compromise, the vendor
stressed.

Multiple SolarWind Vulnerabilities

SolarWinds has not yet disclosed how exactly the attacker managed to gain enough
access on its systems to be able to insert malware into the company's legitimate
software updates. The company has noted that preliminary investigations show a
compromise of SolarWinds' build system.

Data available on the MITRE CVE vulnerability database shows that researchers
have reported 23 vulnerabilities on SolarWinds' technologies this year alone.
Many of them—including six that were disclosed in August—have been in N-Central,
a SolarWinds' remote monitoring technology.

Daniel Trauner, director of security at Axonius, says incidents like this
highlight the importance of good vendor security risk-assessment practices.
Organizations should look at public examples of vendor security risk assessment
questionnaires such as Google’s VSAQ to get an idea of what to focus on, he
says.

At the same time, there are limits to how much vetting one can do, he says.

"Even though larger and more mature enterprises usually have a formal
change-control process designed to minimize the risk inherent in modifying
existing access or systems, there are usually practical limits for this model,"
he says. Most of the focus is going to rightfully be on a subset of critical
systems and specific elements of the change, such as highlighting any privileged
access changes or testing the stability of the system after a patch is applied.

"Unfortunately, there are likely no reasonable routine checks that would have
been part of a change management process that would have caught this backdoored
SolarWinds update," he says.

The SolarWinds incident has punctuated the dangerous exposure of US federal
agencies to threats via the supply chain, says Jacob Olcott vice president of
communications and government affairs at BitSight.

Government agencies rely on a vast third-party supply chain with limited
visibility into the security posture of critical providers, he says. Current
approaches do not adequately address the risk and a significant change in
thinking and technological approach to supply chain security is needed.

"For the last five years, adversaries have been able to access valuable personal
information, sensitive intellectual property, trade secrets, and other critical
national security information by penetrating the government's supply chain,"
Olcott notes.

"It must integrate cybersecurity into all contracts, placing requirements on
contractors to meet certain cybersecurity standards."

Vulnerabilities/ThreatsThreat IntelligenceSecurity MonitoringAdvanced Threats

Keep up with the latest cybersecurity threats, newly-discovered vulnerabilities,
data breach information, and emerging trends. Delivered daily or weekly right to
your email inbox.
Subscribe

More Insights
White Papers
 * 
   9 Traits You Need to Succeed as a Cybersecurity Leader
 * 
   The Ultimate Guide to the CISSP

More White Papers
Webinars
 * 
   Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
 * 
   Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk

More Webinars
Reports
 * 
   Successfully Managing Identity in Modern Cloud and Hybrid Environments
 * 
   The 10 Most Impactful Types of Vulnerabilities for Enterprises Today

More Reports

Editors' Choice
7 Things Your Ransomware Response Playbook Is Likely Missing
Becky Bracken, Editor, Dark Reading
Samsung Engineers Feed Sensitive Data to ChatGPT, Sparking Workplace AI Warnings
Jai Vijayan, Contributing Writer, Dark Reading
LastPass Breach Reveals Important Lessons
Mike Walters, VP of Vulnerability and Threat Research & Co-Founder, Action1
Corporation
FIN7, Former Conti Gang Members Collaborate on 'Domino' Malware
Jai Vijayan, Contributing Writer, Dark Reading
Webinars
 * Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
 * Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk
 * Puzzled by Patching: Solve Endpoint Pains
 * Building the SOC of the Future: Next-Gen Security Operations
 * Everything you Need to Know about DNS Attacks

More Webinars
Reports
 * Successfully Managing Identity in Modern Cloud and Hybrid Environments
 * The 10 Most Impactful Types of Vulnerabilities for Enterprises Today
 * Shoring Up the Software Supply Chain Across Enterprise Applications
 * The Promise and Reality of Cloud Security
 * 10 Hot Talks From Black Hat USA 2022

More Reports

White Papers
 * 9 Traits You Need to Succeed as a Cybersecurity Leader
 * The Ultimate Guide to the CISSP
 * AppSec Best Practices: Where Speed, Security, and Innovation Meet in the
   Middle
 * The 3 Approaches to Breach & Attack Simulation Technologies
 * Know your customer: Enable a 360-degree view with customer identity & access
   management

More White Papers
Events
 * Anatomy of a Data Breach - A Dark Reading June 22 Event
 * Black Hat USA - August 5-10 - Learn More
 * Black Hat Asia - May 9-12 - Learn More

More Events
More Insights
White Papers
 * 
   9 Traits You Need to Succeed as a Cybersecurity Leader
 * 
   The Ultimate Guide to the CISSP

More White Papers
Webinars
 * 
   Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT and Cybersecurity: A Match Made in Heaven or
   a Hack Waiting to Happen?
 * 
   Unleashing AI to Assess Cybersecurity Risk

More Webinars
Reports
 * 
   Successfully Managing Identity in Modern Cloud and Hybrid Environments
 * 
   The 10 Most Impactful Types of Vulnerabilities for Enterprises Today

More Reports

DISCOVER MORE FROM INFORMA TECH

 * Interop
 * InformationWeek
 * Network Computing
 * ITPro Today

 * Data Center Knowledge
 * Black Hat
 * Omdia

WORKING WITH US

 * About Us
 * Advertise
 * Reprints

FOLLOW DARK READING ON SOCIAL

 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 


 * Home
 * Cookies
 * Privacy
 * Terms



Copyright © 2023 Informa PLC Informa UK Limited is a company registered in
England and Wales with company number 1072954 whose registered office is 5
Howick Place, London, SW1P 1WG.





Cookies Button


ABOUT COOKIES ON THIS SITE

We and our partners use cookies to enhance your website experience, learn how
our site is used, offer personalised features, measure the effectiveness of our
services, and tailor content and ads to your interests while you navigate on the
web or interact with us across devices. You can choose to accept all of these
cookies or only essential cookies. To learn more or manage your preferences,
click “Settings”. For further information about the data we collect from you,
please see our Privacy Policy

Accept All
Settings



COOKIE PREFERENCE CENTER

When you visit any website, it may store or retrieve information on your
browser, mostly in the form of cookies. This information might be about you,
your preferences or your device and is mostly used to make the site work as you
expect it to. The information does not usually directly identify you, but it can
give you a more personalized web experience. Because we respect your right to
privacy, you can choose not to allow some types of cookies. Click on the
different category headings to find out more and change our default settings.
However, blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience of the site
and the services we are able to offer.
More information
Allow All


MANAGE CONSENT PREFERENCES

STRICTLY NECESSARY COOKIES

Always Active

These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched
off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you
which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy
preferences, logging in or filling in forms.    You can set your browser to
block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then
work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.

Cookies Details‎

PERFORMANCE COOKIES

Performance Cookies

These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and
improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the
most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site.    All
information these cookies collect is aggregated and therefore anonymous. If you
do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and
will not be able to monitor its performance.

Cookies Details‎

FUNCTIONAL COOKIES

Functional Cookies

These cookies enable the website to provide enhanced functionality and
personalisation. They may be set by us or by third party providers whose
services we have added to our pages.    If you do not allow these cookies then
some or all of these services may not function properly.

Cookies Details‎

TARGETING COOKIES

Targeting Cookies

These cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may
be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you
relevant adverts on other sites.    They do not store directly personal
information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet
device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted
advertising.

Cookies Details‎
Back Button


BACK



Search Icon
Filter Icon

Clear
checkbox label label
Apply Cancel
Consent Leg.Interest
checkbox label label
checkbox label label
checkbox label label

 * 
   
   View Cookies
   
    * Name
      cookie name

Confirm My Choices