Security
Headlines
HeadlinesLatestCVEs

Headline

Hackers Deploy "SUBMARINE" Backdoor in Barracuda Email Security Gateway Attacks

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Friday disclosed details of a “novel persistent backdoor” called SUBMARINE deployed by threat actors in connection with the hack on Barracuda Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances. "SUBMARINE comprises multiple artifacts — including a SQL trigger, shell scripts, and a loaded library for a Linux daemon — that together enable

The Hacker News
#sql#vulnerability#web#google#linux#intel#backdoor#zero_day#The Hacker News

Email Security / Vulnerability

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Friday disclosed details of a “novel persistent backdoor” called SUBMARINE deployed by threat actors in connection with the hack on Barracuda Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances.

“SUBMARINE comprises multiple artifacts — including a SQL trigger, shell scripts, and a loaded library for a Linux daemon — that together enable execution with root privileges, persistence, command and control, and cleanup,” the agency said.

The findings come from an analysis of malware samples obtained from an unnamed organization that had been compromised by threat actors exploiting a critical flaw in ESG devices, CVE-2023-2868 (CVSS score: 9.8), which allows for remote command injection.

Evidence gathered so far shows that the attackers behind the activity, a suspected China nexus-actor tracked by Mandiant as UNC4841, leveraged the flaw as a zero-day in October 2022 to gain initial access to victim environments and implanted backdoors to establish and maintain persistence.

To that end, the infection chain involved sending phishing emails with booby-trapped TAR file attachments to trigger exploitation, leading to the deployment of a reverse shell payload to establish communication with the threat actor’s command-and-control (C2) server, from where a passive backdoor known as SEASPY is downloaded for executing arbitrary commands on the device.

SUBMARINE, also codenamed DEPTHCHARGE by the Google-owned threat intelligence firm, is the latest malware family to be discovered in connection with the operation, which resides in a Structured Query Language (SQL) database on the ESG appliance.

UPCOMING WEBINAR

Shield Against Insider Threats: Master SaaS Security Posture Management

Worried about insider threats? We’ve got you covered! Join this webinar to explore practical strategies and the secrets of proactive security with SaaS Security Posture Management.

Join Today

It’s believed to have been “deployed in response to remediation efforts,” echoing Mandiant’s characterization of the adversary as an aggressive actor capable of quickly altering their malware and employing additional persistence mechanisms in an attempt to maintain their access.

The agency further said it “analyzed artifacts related to SUBMARINE that contained the contents of the compromised SQL database,” and that it “poses a severe threat for lateral movement.”

Found this article interesting? Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn to read more exclusive content we post.

Related news

Chinese Hackers Exploited New Zero-Day in Barracuda's ESG Appliances

Barracuda has revealed that Chinese threat actors exploited a new zero-day in its Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances to deploy backdoor on a "limited number" of devices. Tracked as CVE-2023-7102, the issue relates to a case of arbitrary code execution that resides within a third-party and open-source library Spreadsheet::ParseExcel that's used by the Amavis scanner within the

Chinese Hacking Group Exploits Barracuda Zero-Day to Target Government, Military, and Telecom

A suspected Chinese-nexus hacking group exploited a recently disclosed zero-day flaw in Barracuda Networks Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances to breach government, military, defense and aerospace, high-tech industry, and telecom sectors as part of a global espionage campaign. Mandiant, which is tracking the activity under the name UNC4841, described the threat actor as "highly responsive to

FBI confirms Barracuda patch is not effective for exploited ESG appliances

Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Tags: Barracuda ESG Tags: CVE-2023-2868 Tags: SEASPY Tags: SUBMARINE Tags: WHIRLPOOL The FBI repeats the warning by Barracuda that all ESG appliances should immediately be replaced because the patch was ineffective. (Read more...) The post FBI confirms Barracuda patch is not effective for exploited ESG appliances appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.

Urgent FBI Warning: Barracuda Email Gateways Vulnerable Despite Recent Patches

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is warning that Barracuda Networks Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances patched against a recently disclosed critical flaw continue to be at risk of potential compromise from suspected Chinese hacking groups. It also deemed the fixes as "ineffective" and that it "continues to observe active intrusions and considers all affected Barracuda ESG

Compromised Barracuda appliances equipped with persistent backdoors by attackers

Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Tags: Barracuda Tags: ESG Tags: CVE-2023-2868 Tags: SUBMARINE Tags: SEASPY Tags: shell CISA has released three reports based on the analysis of backdoors planted on compromised Barracuda ESG appliances (Read more...) The post Compromised Barracuda appliances equipped with persistent backdoors by attackers appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.

Critical Barracuda ESG Zero-Day Linked to Novel Chinese APT

A PRC-aligned actor used a trio of custom malware to take advantage of inherent weaknesses in edge appliances.

Chinese UNC4841 Group Exploits Zero-Day Flaw in Barracuda Email Security Gateway

A suspected China-nexus threat actor dubbed UNC4841 has been linked to the exploitation of a recently patched zero-day flaw in Barracuda Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances since October 2022. "UNC4841 is an espionage actor behind this wide-ranging campaign in support of the People's Republic of China," Google-owned Mandiant said in a new report published today, describing the group as "

Barracuda Urges Replacing — Not Patching — Its Email Security Gateways

It's not often that a zero-day vulnerability causes a network security vendor to urge customers to physically remove and decommission an entire line of affected hardware -- as opposed to just applying software updates. But experts say that is exactly what transpired this week with Barracuda Networks, as the company struggled to combat a sprawling malware threat which appears to have undermined its email security appliances in such a fundamental way that they can no longer be safely updated with software fixes.

Barracuda Urges Immediate Replacement of Hacked ESG Appliances

Enterprise security company Barracuda is now urging customers who were impacted by a recently disclosed zero-day flaw in its Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances to immediately replace them. "Impacted ESG appliances must be immediately replaced regardless of patch version level," the company said in an update, adding its "remediation recommendation at this time is full replacement of the

Alert: Hackers Exploit Barracuda Email Security Gateway 0-Day Flaw for 7 Months

Enterprise security firm Barracuda on Tuesday disclosed that a recently patched zero-day flaw in its Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances had been abused by threat actors since October 2022 to backdoor the devices. The latest findings show that the critical vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2023-2868 (CVSS score: N/A), has been actively exploited for at least seven months prior to its discovery.

Barracuda Networks patches zero-day vulnerability in Email Security Gateway

Categories: Exploits and vulnerabilities Categories: News Barracuda Networks issued a patch for a zero-day vulnerability in its Email Security Gateway that was actively being exploited (Read more...) The post Barracuda Networks patches zero-day vulnerability in Email Security Gateway appeared first on Malwarebytes Labs.

Barracuda Warns of Zero-Day Exploited to Breach Email Security Gateway Appliances

Email protection and network security services provider Barracuda is warning users about a zero-day flaw that it said has been exploited to breach the company's Email Security Gateway (ESG) appliances. The zero-day is being tracked as CVE-2023-2868 and has been described as a remote code injection vulnerability affecting versions 5.1.3.001 through 9.2.0.006. The California-headquartered firm

CVE-2023-2868: Barracuda identified a vulnerability (CVE-2023-2868) in our Email Security Gateway appliance (ESG) on May 19, 2023.

A remote command injection vulnerability exists in the Barracuda Email Security Gateway (appliance form factor only) product effecting versions 5.1.3.001-9.2.0.006. The vulnerability arises out of a failure to comprehensively sanitize the processing of .tar file (tape archives). The vulnerability stems from incomplete input validation of a user-supplied .tar file as it pertains to the names of the files contained within the archive. As a consequence, a remote attacker can specifically format these file names in a particular manner that will result in remotely executing a system command through Perl's qx operator with the privileges of the Email Security Gateway product. This issue was fixed as part of BNSF-36456 patch. This patch was automatically applied to all customer appliances.