Headline
New ESXiArgs encryption routine outmaneuvers recovery methods
Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: ESXi
Tags: ESXiArgs
Tags: encryption routine
The ransomware group behind the massive attack on ESXi Virtual Machines has come up with a new variant that can no longer be decrypted with the existing recovery script
(Read more…)
The post New ESXiArgs encryption routine outmaneuvers recovery methods appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
In what seems to be a typical arms race where one side responds to counter the progress the other side has made, the ransomware group behind the massive attack on ESXi Virtual Machines (VMs) has come up with a new variant that can no longer be decrypted with the recovery script released by the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).
New encryption routine
Victims have reported a new variant of the encryptor that no longer leaves large chunks of data unencrypted. This makes recovery next to impossible. The recovery script released by CISA for organizations that have fallen victim to ESXiArgs ransomware reportedly no longer works for this new variant. CISA compiled the ESXiArgs-Recover tool based on publicly available resources, including a tutorial by Enes Sonmez and Ahmet Aykac. The decryption tool uses the large and therefore mostly non-encrypted flat files, where the virtual machine’s disk data is stored, to recover the VMs.
Where the old encryption routine skipped large chunks of data based on the size of the file, the new encryption routine only skips small (1MB) pieces and then encrypts the next 1MB. This ensures that all files larger than 128 MB are encrypted for 50%. Files under 128MB are fully encrypted which was also the case in the old variant.
Ransom note
Victims can tell the variants apart by looking at the ransom note. The new variant no longer mentions the Bitcoin address in the ransom note, but tells victims to contact the threat actor on TOX, an encrypted messaging service. It is likely that this change was triggered by the fear of tracking payments through the blockchain which might eventually lead to the threat actor.
Attack vector
As we mentioned in our initial report about this attack wave:
“While all clues point to CVE-2021-21974 there are several critical vulnerabilities in VMware ESXi like CVE-2022-31696, CVE-2022-31697, CVE-2022-31698, and CVE-2022-31699, that can potentially lead to remote code execution (RCE) on affected systems.”
Some victims have stated that they had SLP disabled, which was a workaround suggested by VMware for the two year old vulnerability that is the prime, but not the only, suspect in this case.
Please
According to CISA and the FBI, some 3800 servers have fallen victim to EXSiArgs globally.
So, either update ESXi, or probably even better, make your ESXi VMs inaccessible from the internet.
Many aspects of this attack remain unclear and when new details become known we will keep you posted.
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.
Related news
gRPC contains a vulnerability that allows hpack table accounting errors could lead to unwanted disconnects between clients and servers in exceptional cases/ Three vectors were found that allow the following DOS attacks: - Unbounded memory buffering in the HPACK parser - Unbounded CPU consumption in the HPACK parser The unbounded CPU consumption is down to a copy that occurred per-input-block in the parser, and because that could be unbounded due to the memory copy bug we end up with an O(n^2) parsing loop, with n selected by the client. The unbounded memory buffering bugs: - The header size limit check was behind the string reading code, so we needed to first buffer up to a 4 gigabyte string before rejecting it as longer than 8 or 16kb. - HPACK varints have an encoding quirk whereby an infinite number of 0’s can be added at the start of an integer. gRPC’s hpack parser needed to read all of them before concluding a parse. - gRPC’s metadata overflow check was performed per frame, so ...
Wide use and lack of support for malware detection technologies has made VMware's virtualization technology a prime target for cyberattackers.
It's not just Internet-accessible hosts that are vulnerable, researchers say.
After the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a decryptor for affected victims to recover from ESXiArgs ransomware attacks, the threat actors have bounced back with an updated version that encrypts more data. The emergence of the new variant was reported by a system administrator on an online forum, where another participant stated that files larger than 128MB
By Deeba Ahmed The recovery tool is available on GitHub for free. This is a post from HackRead.com Read the original post: CISA Offers Recovery Tool for ESXiArgs Ransomware Victims
The malware has affected thousands of VMware ESXi hypervisors in the last few days.
By Deeba Ahmed The refutation came days after Europe and North America were rattled by ESXiArgs Ransomware attacks. This is a post from HackRead.com Read the original post: VMware Disputes Old Flaws at Root of ESXiArgs Ransomware Attacks
VMware on Monday said it found no evidence that threat actors are leveraging an unknown security flaw, i.e., a zero-day, in its software as part of an ongoing ransomware attack spree worldwide. "Most reports state that End of General Support (EoGS) and/or significantly out-of-date products are being targeted with known vulnerabilities which were previously addressed and disclosed in VMware
Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: VMware Tags: ESXi Tags: Nevada Tags: ransomware Tags: Linux Tags: CVE-2021-21974 Over the weekend, several CERTs warned about ongoing ransomware attacks against unpatched VMware ESXi virtual machines. (Read more...) The post Two year old vulnerability used in ransomware attack against VMware ESXi appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: VMware Tags: ESXi Tags: Nevada Tags: ransomware Tags: Linux Tags: CVE-2021-21974 Over the weekend, several CERTs warned about ongoing ransomware attacks against unpatched VMware ESXi virtual machines. (Read more...) The post Two year old vulnerability used in ransomware attack against VMware ESXi appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: VMware Tags: ESXi Tags: Nevada Tags: ransomware Tags: Linux Tags: CVE-2021-21974 Over the weekend, several CERTs warned about ongoing ransomware attacks against unpatched VMware ESXi virtual machines. (Read more...) The post Two year old vulnerability used in ransomware attack against VMware ESXi appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: VMware Tags: ESXi Tags: Nevada Tags: ransomware Tags: Linux Tags: CVE-2021-21974 Over the weekend, several CERTs warned about ongoing ransomware attacks against unpatched VMware ESXi virtual machines. (Read more...) The post Two year old vulnerability used in ransomware attack against VMware ESXi appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Categories: Ransomware Tags: VMware Tags: ESXi Tags: Nevada Tags: ransomware Tags: Linux Tags: CVE-2021-21974 Over the weekend, several CERTs warned about ongoing ransomware attacks against unpatched VMware ESXi virtual machines. (Read more...) The post Two year old vulnerability used in ransomware attack against VMware ESXi appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.
VMware ESXi hypervisors are the target of a new wave of attacks designed to deploy ransomware on compromised systems. "These attack campaigns appear to exploit CVE-2021-21974, for which a patch has been available since February 23, 2021," the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) of France said in an advisory on Friday. VMware, in its own alert released at the time, described the issue as an
Dell VxRail, versions prior to 7.0.410, contain a Container Escape Vulnerability. A local high-privileged attacker could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to the execution of arbitrary OS commands on the container's underlying OS. Exploitation may lead to a system take over by an attacker.
Dell VxRail, versions prior to 7.0.410, contain a Container Escape Vulnerability. A local high-privileged attacker could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to the execution of arbitrary OS commands on the container's underlying OS. Exploitation may lead to a system take over by an attacker.
Dell VxRail, versions prior to 7.0.410, contain a Container Escape Vulnerability. A local high-privileged attacker could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to the execution of arbitrary OS commands on the container's underlying OS. Exploitation may lead to a system take over by an attacker.
Dell VxRail, versions prior to 7.0.410, contain a Container Escape Vulnerability. A local high-privileged attacker could potentially exploit this vulnerability, leading to the execution of arbitrary OS commands on the container's underlying OS. Exploitation may lead to a system take over by an attacker.
Marcin ‘Icewall’ Noga of Cisco Talos discovered this vulnerability. Cisco Talos recently discovered a denial-of-service vulnerability in VMWare vCenter Server. VMware vCenter Server is a platform that enables centralized control and monitoring over all virtual machines and EXSi hypervisors included in vSphere. TALOS-2022-1588 (CVE-2022-31698) concerns a pre-authentication denial-of-service
VMware ESXi contains a heap-overflow vulnerability. A malicious local actor with restricted privileges within a sandbox process may exploit this issue to achieve a partial information disclosure.
VMware ESXi contains a heap-overflow vulnerability. A malicious local actor with restricted privileges within a sandbox process may exploit this issue to achieve a partial information disclosure.
VMware ESXi contains a heap-overflow vulnerability. A malicious local actor with restricted privileges within a sandbox process may exploit this issue to achieve a partial information disclosure.
VMware ESXi contains a heap-overflow vulnerability. A malicious local actor with restricted privileges within a sandbox process may exploit this issue to achieve a partial information disclosure.
A parsing vulnerability for the MessageSet type in the ProtocolBuffers versions prior to and including 3.16.1, 3.17.3, 3.18.2, 3.19.4, 3.20.1 and 3.21.5 for protobuf-cpp, and versions prior to and including 3.16.1, 3.17.3, 3.18.2, 3.19.4, 3.20.1 and 4.21.5 for protobuf-python can lead to out of memory failures. A specially crafted message with multiple key-value per elements creates parsing issues, and can lead to a Denial of Service against services receiving unsanitized input. We recommend upgrading to versions 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 3.21.6 for protobuf-cpp and 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 4.21.6 for protobuf-python. Versions for 3.16 and 3.17 are no longer updated.
OpenSLP as used in ESXi (7.0 before ESXi70U1c-17325551, 6.7 before ESXi670-202102401-SG, 6.5 before ESXi650-202102101-SG) has a heap-overflow vulnerability. A malicious actor residing within the same network segment as ESXi who has access to port 427 may be able to trigger the heap-overflow issue in OpenSLP service resulting in remote code execution.