Tag Archives: Cyber Attack

(3) ESXi Zero Day Vulnerabilities: CVE-2025–22224/22225/22226

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Written By: Kevin Beaumont

March 4th, VMware quietly released patches for three ESXi zero day vulnerabilities: CVE-2025–22224, CVE-2025–22225, CVE-2025–22226.

Although the advisory doesn’t explicitly say it, this is a hypervisor escape (aka a VM Escape). A threat actor with access to run code on a virtual machine can chain the three vulnerabilities to elevate access to the ESX hypervisor.

This is backed up by VMware’s official Github, which says:

Yes, this is being actively exploited in the wild.

Once you have ESX access, you can access everything on the ESX server — which includes things such as VM data, and crucially ESX config and mounted storage. Using ESX config and mounted network storage, you can traverse the VMware environment.

My pretty diagram:

Feel free to use this carefully prepared graphic to brief your board or the public

For example, orgs use vMotion to allow virtual machines to automatically move across ESX hosts, to balance load and allow for maintenance without downtime (it’s how VMware security patching works). Because of this, a threat actor has direct access to storage of VMs both on and not on that host by design — they’re basically loose on the backend.

Areas of concern

ESXi is a ‘black box’ environment, where you don’t have EDR tools and such — it is locked down. As such, a hypervisor escape means a threat actor is outside of all security tooling and monitoring. They can, for example, access Active Directory Domain Controller databases without triggering any alerts anywhere in the stack, or delete data.

This is frequently seen in ransomware incidents, where people directly exploit the ESX server or vCenter server over the VMware management network using unpatched vulnerabilities. Once they reach ESX, they reach directly into storage across the whole cluster.

However, being able to reach the ESX server hypervisor directly from the Virtual Machine significantly raises the risk. For example, you don’t need to find the ESX server details, or reach a segregated network.

‘But Kevin’ you may say ‘if a threat actor gained access to a VM it’d be game over’. Well… not so much. Threat actors gain access to endpoints all the time in any large org, e.g. malware initial access on end user PCs. When you have VDIs on VMware, you have a problem. When you have shared servers on VMware, you have a problem. Compromise one of system in a company is not usually a big problem in the short term. Immediate compromise of all of them is a big problem.

Additionally, there are around 500 Managed VMware providers, who operate as effectively clouds, allowing SMBs to purchase fully managed VMs, on demand compute basically. A compromise of one customer VM would allow compromise of every customer VM in the same managed provider.

This also applies to companies who have built their own Private Clouds using VMware, and use VMware to segregate business units.

Versions impacted

The Broadcom advisory is currently incomplete for some reason. For example VMware’s Github lists versions 6.5 and 6.7 as impacted, and patches are available on VMware’s website — but VMware’s advisory on the Broadcom site doesn’t list them as impacted as of writing. Basically, every release of ESX is impacted.

I understand 5.5 is also impacted, however it is out of support so no patch is available.

Continue reading article here!

SANS Sees Phishers Use Tricky Hyphens in URLs

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To a phisher, one tiny hyphen can make a big mark.

SANS Technology Institute Dean of Research Johannes Ullrich alerted users to a “clever” phishing tactic that uses a URL containing a “com-” domain prefix. With that tiny, easy-to-miss hyphen, threat actors can disguise a malicious destination.

Ullrich noted on the SANS site that the phishing tactic was placed into fraudulent messages alerting a user of unpaid tolls. (The FBI warned the public of toll trolls in April 2024, when there were over 2,000 complaints of attacks using fake text messages.)

How the “.com-” tactic works. A legitimate site involving Florida’s toll system (SunPass) would involve a forward slash and look something like: “sunpass.com/tolls.”

In instances discovered by Ullrich and shared on the SANS site, the phisher registers for and receives a domain that begins with “com-,” followed by seemingly random letters, then ending with a top-level domain, like .info, .top, .xyz, and even .com.

To a reader, the phishy URL appears as something like: “sunpass.com-[random letters].top”—a tricky difference to notice when you’re quickly looking on a tiny phone screen and it appears that you owe toll money.

Fraud jobs. URL obfuscation is a favorite tactic of opportunistic threat actors, who register mimicking domains to trick fans of events like the Super Bowl or the Olympics. (Business administration company CSC identified 5,000 unique domain registrations mimicking well-known sportsbooks, between Jan. 1, 2023, and Dec. 24, 2024, for example.)

According to the FTC, government impersonation scammers led to $618 million in losses in 2023, up from $497 million in 2022 and $428 million in 2021.

Dash money. Ullrich told IT Brew that he continues to see “com-” domains registered: 315 on Feb. 11, 428 on Feb. 10, and 269 on Feb 9. (The sites are often short-lived and quickly shut down as fraudulent, he added.)

Many of the questionable domains point to the same IP address, Ullrich said, suggesting one actor is registering and rotating between them.

Ullrich also shared with IT Brew a new twist on the hyphen-ishing trend: A “com.-” domain prefix with a “.com” ending to the URL, and a “case number” in between to convince targeted users that the sender is from an IT support team.

“They can use any prefix for the domain to impersonate arbitrary .com domains,” Ullrich told us in an email.

In his Feb. 5 post, Ullrich advised IT pros to review DNS queries for these kinds of prefixes.

SOURCE ARTICLE:

https://www.itbrew.com/stories/2025/02/18/sans-sees-phishers-use-tricky-hyphens-in-urls?mbcid=38663986.101742&mblid=0526c530a3f5&mid=bfeacb7fd34941195bb37df6366acc6f&utm_campaign=itb&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_source=morning_brew

The Art of Linux Kernel Rootkits

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1. What is a rooktit?

A rootkit is malware whose main objective and purpose is to maintain persistence within a system, remain completely hidden, hide processes, hide directories, etc., in order to avoid detection.

This makes its detection very complex, and its mitigation even more complex, since one of the main objectives of a rootkit is to remain hidden.

A rootkit, it changes the system’s default behavior to what it wants.

1.1 What is a kernel? Userland and kernel land differences

The kernel is the core of the operating system, responsible for managing system resources and facilitating communication between hardware and software. It operates at the lowest layer of the system, for example components that operate in kernel land include the kernel itself, device drivers and kernel modules (which we call Loadable Kernel Module, short for LKM).

On the other hand, the userland or userspace is the layer where user programs and applications are executed. This is the part of the OS that interacts with the user, including browsers, text editors, games, common programs that the user uses, etc.

1.2 What is a system call?

System calls (syscalls) are fundamental in OS, they allow running processes to request services from the kernel

These services include operations such as file management, inter-process communication, process creation and management, among others.

A very practical example is when we write code in C, a simple hello world, if we analyze it with strace for example, you will notice that it uses sys_write to be able to write Hello world.

root@infect:~# cat hello.c ; ls hello
#include <stdio.h>

int main() {
    printf("Hello, World!\n");
    return 0;
}
hello
root@infect:~# strace ./hello 2>&1 | grep write

write(1, "Hello, World!\n", 14Hello, World!
root@infect:~#
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Palo Alto Networks Tags New Firewall Bug

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Palo Alto Networks warns that a file read vulnerability (CVE-2025-0111) is now being chained in attacks with two other flaws (CVE-2025-0108 with CVE-2024-9474) to breach PAN-OS firewalls in active attacks.

The vendor first disclosed the authentication bypass vulnerability tracked as CVE-2025-0108 on February 12, 2025, releasing patches to fix the vulnerability. That same day, Assetnote researchers published a proof-of-concept exploit demonstrating how CVE-2025-0108 and CVE-2024-9474 could be chained together to gain root privileges on unpatched PAN-OS firewalls.

A day later, network threat intel firm GreyNoise reported that threat actors had begun actively exploiting the flaws, with attempts coming from two IP addresses.

CVE-2024-9474 is a privilege escalation flaw in PAN-OS fixed in November 2024 that allows a PAN-OS administrator to execute commands on firewalls with root privileges. Palo Alto Networks warned at the disclosure that the vulnerability was exploited as a zero-day.

CVE-2025-0111 is a file read vulnerability in PAN-OS, allowing authenticated attackers with network access to the management web interface to read files that are readable by the “nobody” user.

The CVE-2025-0111 flaw was also fixed on February 12, 2025, but the vendor updated its bulletin today to warn that it is also now being used in an exploit chain with the other two vulnerabilities in active attacks.

“Palo Alto Networks has observed exploit attempts chaining CVE-2025-0108 with CVE-2024-9474 and CVE-2025-0111 on unpatched and unsecured PAN-OS web management interfaces,” reads the updated bulletin.

While Palo Alto Networks has not shared how the exploit chain is being abused, BleepingComputer has been told they could be chained together to download configuration files and other sensitive information.

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Apple Fixes Zero-Day Vulnerability – Update ASAP!

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Apple has released an emergency security update for a vulnerability which it says may have been exploited in an “extremely sophisticated attack against specific targeted individuals.”

The update is available for:

  • iOS 18.3.1 and iPadOS 18.3.1 – iPhone XS and later, iPad Pro 13-inch, iPad Pro 12.9-inch 3rd generation and later, iPad Pro 11-inch 1st generation and later, iPad Air 3rd generation and later, iPad 7th generation and later, and iPad mini 5th generation and later
  • iPadOS 17.7.5 – iPad Pro 12.9-inch 2nd generation, iPad Pro 10.5-inch, and iPad 6th generation

If you use any of these then you should install updates as soon as you can. To check if you’re using the latest software version, go to Settings (or System Settings) > General > Software Update. It’s also worth turning on Automatic Updates if you haven’t already, which you can do on the same screen.

Technical details

The new-found zero-day vulnerability is tracked as CVE-2025-24200. When exploited, the vulnerability would allow an attacker to disable USB Restricted Mode on a locked device. The attack would require physical access to your device

The introduction of USB Restricted Mode feature came with iOS 11.4.1 in July 2018. The feature was designed to make it more difficult for attackers to unlock your iPhone. When USB Restricted Mode is active, your device’s Lightning port (where you plug in the charging cable) will only allow charging after the device has been locked for more than an hour. This means that if someone tries to connect your locked iPhone to a computer or other device to access its data, they won’t be able to do so unless they have your passcode.

To enhance data security, especially when traveling or in public places, it is recommended that you enable USB Restricted Mode in your device settings. If your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch is running iOS 11.4.1 or later, USB Restricted Mode is automatically on by default, but if you want to check and enable USB Restricted Mode, this can be done by going to Settings > Face ID & Passcode or Touch ID & Passcode > (USB) Accessories and toggling off (grey) the (USB) Accessories option. Enabling this setting adds an extra layer of protection against unauthorized data access.

Please note: toggling the option to green turns this feature off.

Vulnerabilities like these typically target specific individuals as deployed by commercial spyware vendors like Pegasus and Paragon. This means the average user does not need to fear attacks as long as the details are not published. But once they are, other cybercriminals will try to copy them.

Source Article:

https://www.malwarebytes.com/blog/news/2025/02/apple-fixes-zero-day-vulnerability-used-in-extremely-sophisticated-attack?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=b2c_pro_oth_20250217_februaryweeklynewsletter_v3_173948923242&utm_content=Apple_fixes