There are many frameworks that you can use to protect a company infrastructure

Mon, 12 Nov 2018 23:03:00 +0000

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Windows 10 shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are keys or combinations of keys that provide an alternative way to do something that you’d typically do with a mouse.

Fri, 09 Nov 2018 14:16:00 +0000

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RID Hijacking

Relative Identifier (RID) Hijacking has recently gained public attention as a simple, novel, and effective technique to maintain persistence on a Windows system after initial compromise. As information security awareness continues to rise in many organizations their overall security posture also increases, especially in larger organizations that can afford it. As a result, many attackers are forced to leverage stealth techniques when targeting these types of companies to bypass security mechanisms.
RID Hijacking effectively allows attackers to assign higher level administrative privileges to lower level accounts that they might have direct access to after initial system compromise. What makes this method so attractive to attackers is that it leverages strictly Windows native commands to execute the technique, does not require installing any additional software, and is a relatively simple process. Therefore, it does not make much noise on a system and in many cases is difficult to detect unless defenders are carefully monitoring the Security Account Manager ( SAM) registry.
Since Windows XP, Windows uses the SAM to store security descriptors for user accounts. These Windows systems store most of this information in the ‘HKLM\SAM\SAM\Domains\Account\Use rs’ key, which does require SYSTEM level privileges to access. This key contains a variety of structured information representing user privilege information. The ‘Names’ subkey contains all the local user account names and looking at the ‘F’ value within this structure is a long number that contains the RID value at hex offset 30 within it along with other interesting information such as whether the account is enabled or disabled. According to security researcher, Sebastian Castro the RID copy stored in the ‘F’ value hex number is the value that is used by the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS) and the Security Reference Monitor (SRM) to generate the primary access token used when translating from username to security identifier (SID). This token essentially is used on the system when users are attempting to access system services and applications. So if an attacker can modify the RID value to hex 0x1f4 or 500 in decimal of a guest user account as an example, they can give that guest account system level access. This technique is known as RID hijacking.
Sebastian Castro, the security researcher investigating this vulnerability also published an exploit which automates this attack in Metasploit, which is a popular open source exploit framework used by many worldwide. The exploit can be found at ‘post/windows/manage/ rid_hijack’ within the framework. This exploit has been tested on Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10. The best-recommended way to defend against this attack is by monitoring the system registry and looking for inconsistencies within the SAM.
  Sources:
https://threatpost.com/trivial-postintrusion-attack-exploits-windowsrid/138448/  https://csl.com.co/en/rid-hijacking/

Fri, 26 Oct 2018 20:07:00 +0000

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Zero-day jQuery Exploit

A zero-day exploit in the jQuery file upload tool may have had an open secret for years. A security researcher at Akamai Security Intelligence Response Team (SIRT) by the name of Larry Cashdollar found the exploit designated CVE-20189206. The vulnerability affects the plugin authored by Sabastian Tschan commonly known as “blueimp”. The jQuery File upload is one of the most starred plugins on github next to the jQuery framework itself. The tool appears to have been forked over 7800 times and has most likely been integrated on thousands of other projects. 
The vulnerability affects Apache web servers that have the plugin and has existed since Apache 2.3.9 when Apache disabled support for .htaccess security configuration files. Unfortunately, jQuery’s file upload relied on .htaccess, and Apache made the change only five days before Sabastian’s plugin was first published. Worse yet it seems that this exploit has been an open secret in the hacker community for years. An attacker can use the vulnerability to upload files without any validation required. This would allow attackers to upload back doors, key loggers, and even execute a web shell on the server. Cashdollar was able to get in touch with Sabastion, and together they were able to work to get the vulnerability fixed in the latest version for the jQuery file upload. However, both noted that it is unlikely to get deployed in all the other projects and/or servers that use the plugin. They stated that there is no accurate way to determine how many projects that have forked from the jQuery file upload and if they are being maintained by applying changes to the master project. Additionally, there are no good ways to determine how many production environments that possibly have the plugin integrated in them.
Cashdollar has also noted that he doubts that he is the only person to find the videos that demonstrate this vulnerability. The videos on YouTube indicate that this exploit has been known and used in some circles for years, so it is possible that hackers have been able to quietly utilize this method to execute remote code on webservers that are using the plugin. However, now that the code has been patched and the exploit has been made public, there is concern that that the risk has increased. With an unknown number of potential forked projects and environments that might use the tool the likelihood that the patch will not entirely eliminate the potential threat. If you want to test your environment for this vulnerability this link will help Https://gethub.com/lcashdol/treee/Exploits/ tree/master/CVE-2018-9206. There you will find the files that will test for three of the most commonly used variations of the exploit software.
Sources:
 https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/10/22/jquery_file_flaw/
https://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/news/252451045/Zero-day-jQueryplugin-vulnerability-exploited-for-3-years
 https://www.zdnet.com/article/zero-day-in-popular-jquery-plugin-activelyexploited-for-at-least-three-years/  
Fri, 26 Oct 2018 20:06:00 +0000

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Windows 10, version 1809 Features removed or planned for replacement

Here is a Blog from Microsoft about changes to Windows 10 1809.

Features we removed in this release

We're removing the following features and functionalities from the installed product image in Windows 10, version 1809. Applications or code that depend on these features won't function in this release unless you use an alternate method.

Features we’re no longer developing

We're no longer actively developing these features and may remove them from a future update. Some features have been replaced with other features or functionality, while others are now available from different sources.

If you have feedback about the proposed replacement of any of these features, you can use the Feedback Hub app.


Sat, 20 Oct 2018 19:51:00 +0000

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macOS 10.12 Draft NIST Security Configuration Checklist

NIST invites comments on Draft Special Publication (SP) 800-179 Revision 1, Guide to Securing macOS 10.12 Systems for IT Professionals: A NIST Security Configuration Checklist. This publication assists IT professionals in securing macOS 10.12 desktop and laptop systems within various environments. It provides detailed information about the security features of macOS 10.12 and security configuration guidelines. The publication recommends and explains tested, secure settings with the objective of simplifying the administrative burden of improving the security of macOS 10.12 systems in three types of environments: standalone, managed, and specialized security-limited functionality.
A public comment period for this document is open until November 16, 2018. We strongly encourage you to use the comment template for submitting your comments.
CSRC Update:
https://csrc.nist.gov/news/2018/nist-releases-draft-sp-800-179-rev-1-for-comment
Publication Details:
https://csrc.nist.gov/publications/details/sp/800-179/rev-1/draft


Sat, 20 Oct 2018 19:37:00 +0000

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SSH ISSUE

For the past four years, thousands of servers may have been subject to an  extremely simple authentication bypass vulnerability. CVE-2018-10933 affects libssh versions since 0.6.0, an implementation library for Secure Shell (SSH) that was released in 2014. It is limited only to certain implementations of SSH and does not affect the widely-used OpenSSH. 
Still, all the attacker has to do is send the server the message SSH2_MSG_USERAUTH_SUCCESS" instead of "SSH2_MSG_USERAUTH_REQUEST" and they have full access. Experts are saying that the overall impact is small, given that OpenSSH is not impacted and a libssh patch has already been released. So how many systems are actually at risk? A quick Shodan search by one researcher returned 6,351 servers just by looking for "libssh". Another researcher added port 22 to the search, bringing the number down to 3,004. But this doesn't tell us how many systems are running vulnerable versions of of libssh. And really, pinning down an accurate number is not easy. Shodan doesn't cover everything that's out there and what's out on the internet can change in the blink of an eye. 



Sat, 20 Oct 2018 15:43:00 +0000

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APT Group TeleBots Linked to Three Major Cyber Attacks

Advanced Persistent Threats (APT) are being recognized as one of the biggest cyber threats in the industry today. There are many groups globally behind the numerous attacks of this type in recent history. Three major cyber incidents that garnered global attention were the BlackEnergy power grid attack, the Industroyer power grid attack, and the NotPetya malware outbreak. However, what if the same APT group was behind all three of these attacks?
The BlackEnergy attack caused blackouts in the Ukranian power grid in December 2015. Industroyer, also known as CrashOverride, also attacked the Ukranian power grid in December 2016 and is the first case of malware designed to specifically target a power grid. After the BlackEnergy attack, the group behind it (also called BlackEnergy) became known as TeleBots and carried out attacks against the Ukranian financial sector, eventually culminating in the outbreak of the NotPetya malware. There was speculation in the cybersecurity community that the BlackEnergy and Industroyer attacks were both perpetrated by the TeleBots group but no evidence to support these claims. However, the discovery of another TeleBots malware, Exramel, by the ESET security group in April 2018 provided the missing link.
Exramel uses a backdoor that appears to be an upgraded version of the backdoor used by Industroyer. There are many similarities in the code, especially the list of available commands it can receive from its Command and Control (C&C) servers and the way each handles reporting and redirecting output streams. Each backdoor also disguises itself as an antivirus service for detection avoidance and groups targets based on their security solutions being used. The similarity between the two led the ESET researchers to conclude that it is unlikely to be a case of coincidental code sharing between threat actors.
Linking TeleBots to Industroyer shows just how much of a threat the group can pose, being the single entity behind three of the most groundbreaking and devastating cyberattacks in history. In addition, the recent claims from multiple governments that Russian military intelligence groups are behind TeleBots throws even more intrigue into the mix and leaves a daunting question: what could TeleBots be up to next?
Sources:

 https://threatpost.com/notpetya-linked-to-industroyer-attack-on-ukraineenergy-grid/138287/
 https://www.zdnet.com/article/security-researchers-find-solid-evidencelinking-industroyer-to-notpetya/
https://www.welivesecurity.com/2018/10/11/new-telebots-backdoorlinking-industroyer-notpetya/ 
Sat, 20 Oct 2018 15:32:00 +0000

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KB4462928 - Critical Update for WS2016 Storage Spaces Direct Deployments

Important Updates

Thu, 18 Oct 2018 17:37:00 +0000

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2018 NY Metro Joint Cyber Security WEBINAR

The 2018 NY Metro Joint Cyber Security WEBINAR will take place on Thursday October 18^th. NYMJCSC is now in its fifth year; featuring keynotes, panels and sessions aimed at various aspects of information security and technology.

This year will feature a webinar format allowing NYMJCSC to reach and educate a broader audience.

To register please go here

Thu, 18 Oct 2018 16:14:00 +0000

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