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APT1 & M-Trends 2013

Grady Summers MAY 9, 2013

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Anatomy of a Targeted Attack

Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Recon Complete Mission

Attackers Move Methodically to GainPersistent & Ongoing Access to Their Targets

At organizations where Mandiant responded to a targeted attack in the last year, the typical attacker went undetected for 273 days.

MoveLaterally

MaintainPresence

• Custom malware

• Command and control

• 3rd party application exploitation

• Credential theft

• Password cracking

• “Pass-the-hash”

• Critical system recon

• System, active directory & user enumeration

• Staging servers

• Data consolidation

• Data theft

• Social engineering

• Spear phishing e-mail with custom malware

• Net use commands

• Reverse shell access

• Backdoor variants

• VPN subversion

• Sleeper malware

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Visibility is critical

Of all of the compromised machines Mandiantidentified in 2011, only 54% had malware on them.

EVIDENCE OF COMPROMISE

Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Recon Complete Mission

MoveLaterally

MaintainPresence

Unauthorized Use of Valid

Accounts

Known & Unknown Malware

Command & Control Activity

Suspicious Network Traffic

Files Accessed by Attackers

Valid Programs Used for Evil

Purposes

Trace Evidence & Partial Files

Inside APT 1

Monday, February 18, 2013 Mandiant released intelligence report on threat group: APT1 Linked APT1 to PLA unit 61398 Provided hard evidence Released 3000+ immediately actionable indicators of

compromise OpenIOC format Malware reports IPs/domain names MD5s SSL Certificates

5 minute video showing footage of the attacker in action Set the bar for actionable intelligence sharing

Background

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~30 core people worked on actual report Threat Intelligence IOCs M-Labs Marketing, legal, execs…

Significant effort to validate and consolidate data (and conduct open source research) under tight deadline

Though the “surge” was intense, it was made possible by 7 years of previous research

The People

Prolific Volume of data stolen Comprehensive understanding of tools, tactics, and

procedures Example of actionable information sharing The timing felt right

Traffic Light Protocol (TLP): Green indicator disclosure Not as intel-sensitive as other groups

Why?

APT 1 – Targets by Industry

APT 1 – Victims by Country

APT 1 – Impact

APT 1 – Command and Control Infrastructure

We’ve received lots of it! Why do you always pick on China?! Focusing on the country of origin is the wrong issue Don’t focus on the attacker, focus on your defenses Mandiant disclosed sensitive intel and ruined intelligence

operations Publicity stunt

Criticisms

CNN video shows military chasing CNN vehicle near the building while filming

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG2ezzLHSD0

Sen. Feinstein, Chairman Senate Intelligence Committee: “I read the Mandiant report. I've also read other reports,

classified out of Intelligence, and I think the Mandiant report, which is now unclassified, it's public, is essentially correct,”

http://thehill.com/blogs/global-affairs/terrorism/284721-intel-chairwoman-report-on-chinas-cyber-war-unit-essentially-correct

Accuracy

DOTA phone number discovered used in 2009 for apartment rental – 600 feet from unit 61398.

SuperHard_M (aka Mei Qiang) likely studied at famous PLA Information Engineering University in 2005.

2004 recruitment notice on Zhejiang University website advertising for “Unit 61398 of China’s PLA (located in Pudong District, Shanghai) seeks to recruit 2003-class computer science graduate students.”

LA Times found blog of possible 61398 worker: http://lat.ms/12OATUY

https://www.mandiant.com/blog/netizen-research-bolsters-apt1-attribution

Accuracy – Netizen Research

Monday 2/18 – Business as usual Report is released at 10 PM EST – 11 AM CST

Tuesday 2/19 – Clear signs of action plan being invoked Domains getting parked WHOIS registry getting changed Backdoor/tools removed Staging/working directories cleared New backdoors implanted (leverage public communications

channels – hotmail/gmail/MSN) MACROMAIL malware from APT1 report

Today: many indicators changed, but otherwise business as usual

APT1 – Reaction after a week

NY Times disclosed internal name APT12 Tools:

APT1 – WEBC2, public communication channels, noisy APT12 – DNS calc, cmdline backdoors, more stealthy

Data theft: APT1 – everything APT12 - discriminating

Skill: APT1 – good enough, large range of skillsets APT12 – more skilled

Industries targeted: APT1 – everything APT12 – satellite, crypto, media

APT1 vs. APT12

M-Trends 2013

Targeted industries

Compromise Detection

Dwell Time

Trend #1 – Outside In

When targeted organizations increase their prevention and detection capability, weaker service providers and partners become targets

Mandiant investigated several organizations that had been compromised through 3rd party connections

15% of victims in 2012 were notified by a service provider

Trend #2 – ‘X’ Marks the Spot

Attacks are becoming more surgical in nature: immediately targeting administrators for network diagrams, sensitive asset lists

Change from historical reliance on internal network reconnaissance

One victim had followed all the necessary precautions to protect their financial information, yet attacks against system administrators yielded necessary data to breach the environment

Trend #3 – Once a Target, Always a Target

Though long known anecdotally, Mandiant measured repeat victimization in 2012

38% of victims were re-compromised within the year

Reminder that persistence means constant attempts at re-compromise until mission is accomplished

Trend #4 – Strategic Web Compromise

Mandiant observed frequent use of strategic web compromises, or “watering hole attacks” over the last year

Financial institutions attacked via Java exploits on local news web sites

Energy companies compromised through an industry portal

Significant collateral damage