Na een pauze, beheer servers van de Emotet botnet hervat haar activiteiten.
Researchers bij Cofense Labs were the first to discover a resurgence of the botnet infrastructure.“De Emotet botnet is ontstaan uit een graf gisteren en begon serveren nieuwe binaries. We hebben gemerkt dat de C2-servers begon het leveren van antwoorden op vragen rond 15:00 EST op aug POST 21. Stay vigilant and keep an eye out for any updates as we monitor for any changes”, – wrote Cofense Labs specialists.
Daarnaast, onderzoekers van Black Lotus have published a list of active servers.
Emotet was previously known as a banking trojan, but then changed course and turned into a botnet, distributing various types of ransomware.
Emotet is now one of the most dangerous threats in the world. The network is used to distribute the trickbot banking Trojan and Ryuk ransomware. This combination of malware was called the “triple threat” and was used as part of attacks on state administrations in the United States in July 2019.
Lees ook: Global Threat Index claimed, that Emotet botnet suspended its activities
Researchers noticed that Emotet operators took a break at the beginning of June and correctly assumed that it would not be for long. No new campaigns were observed since then, and the consensus in the infosec community was that the servers were down for maintenance.
Volgens experts, the servers have just resumed their activity and there have not made any attempts to spread malware. It is assumed that operators need time to restore systems and prepare a new malicious campaign. Security researcher Benkøw provides a tweet-size list of the stages necessary for respawning the malicious activity.
“They reuse the old IPs so they need time to:
– Grab old/new bots
– remove ALL the AV bots from today on the panel lol
– Run some tests for bypassing anti spam product
– Prepare the campaign for the next Clients
etc it takes time”, — wrote Benkøw.
The servers are located in various countries, including Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Duitsland, Japan and the USA.
Given the intense activity, experts expect a new malicious campaign in the near future. Volgens hen, the attackers will adhere to the old ransomware distribution scheme.
