Sofacy, APT 28, Fancy Bear, Sednit

[2011/2012] back In 2011-2012, The Group Used A Relatively Tiny Implant (known As �sofacy� Or Sourface) As Its First Stage Malware. The Implant Shared Certain Similarities With The Old Miniduke Implants. This Led Us To Believe The Two Groups Were Connected, At Least To Begin With, Although It Appears They Parted Ways In 2014, With The Original Miniduke Group Switching To The Cosmicduke Implant.)

[2013] at Some Point During 2013, The Sofacy Group Expanded Its Arsenal And Added More Backdoors And Tools, Including Coreshell, Splm (aka Xagent, Aka Chopstick), Jhuhugit (which Is Built With Code From The Carberp Sources), Azzy (aka Advstoreshell, Netui, Eviltoss, And Spans Across Four To Five Generations) And A Few Others. We�ve Seen Quite A Few Versions Of These Implants And They Were Relatively Widespread For A Time.)

[2014-10] operation �pawn Storm� (target: Several Foreign Affairs Ministries From Around The Globe. (method: Spear-phishing E-mails With Links Leading To An Adobe Flash Exploit. (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-adobe-flash-zero-day-used-in-pawn-storm-campaign/)

[2014-12] six-month-long Cyberattack On The German Parliament (http://www.lse.co.uk/allnews.asp?code=kwdwehme&headline=russian_hackers_suspected_in_cyberattack_on_german_parliament)

[2015-02] u.s. Military Wives� Death Threats (five Military Wives Received Death Threats From A Hacker Group Calling Itself �cyber Caliphate Army (cca), United Cyber Caliphate (ucc)�, Claiming To Be An Islamic State Affiliate, On February 10, 2015. This Was Later Discovered To Have Been A False Flag Attack By Fancy Bear, When The Victims� Email Addresses Were Found To Have Been In The Fancy Bear Phishing Target List. (https://www.apnews.com/4d174e45ef5843a0ba82e804f080988f)

[2015-04] compromise Of Tv5monde In France (�a Group Calling Itself The cyber Caliphate Army (cca), United Cyber Caliphate (ucc), Linked To So-called Islamic State, First Claimed Responsibility. But An Investigation Now Suggests The Attack Was In Fact Carried Out By A Group Of Russian Hackers.� (https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37590375)

[2015-04] operation �russian Doll� (method: Adobe Flash 0-day (https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html)

[2015-04] compromise Of The German Parliament (bundestag) Network (https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on-german-parliament-investigative-report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/)

[2015-07] pawn Storm Up[Trend Micro Discovers New Java Zero-day Exploit (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-update-trend-micro-discovers-new-java-zero-day-exploit/)

[2015-08] eff Spoof, White House And Nato Attack (method: Zero-day Exploit Of Java, Spoofing The Electronic Frontier Foundation And Launching Attacks On The White House And Nato. The Hackers Used A Spear-phishing Attack, Directing Emails To The False Url Electronicfrontierfoundation.org. (https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/08/new-spear-phishing-campaign-pretends-be-eff)

[2015-09] bootstrapped Firefox Add-on (https://labsblog.f-secure.com/2015/09/08/sofacy-recycles-carberp-and-metasploit-code/)

[2015-10] attack On Bellingcat (eliot Higgins And Other Journalists Associated With Bellingcat, A Group Researching The Shoot Down Of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 Over Ukraine, Were Targeted By Numerous Spear-phishing Emails. The Messages Were Fake Gmail Security Notices With Bit.ly And Tinycc Shortened Urls. (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-targets-mh17-investigation-team/)

[2015-10] attack On Dutch Safety Board (the Group Targeted The Dutch Safety Board, The Body Conducting The Official Investigation Into The Crash, Before And After The Release Of The Board�s Final Report. They Set Up Fake Sftp And Vpn Servers To Mimic The Board�s Own Servers, Likely For The Purpose Of Spear-phishing Usernames And Passwords. (https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/russia-tried-to-hack-mh17-inquiry-system/ar-bbmmuut)

[2015-10] new Adobe Flash Zero-day Used In Pawn Storm Campaign Targeting Foreign Affairs Ministries (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-adobe-flash-zero-day-used-in-pawn-storm-campaign/)

[2016-01] pawn Storm Campaign Adds Turkey To Its List Of Targets (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-adds-turkey-list-targets/)

[2016-05] pawn Storm Targets German Christian Democratic Union (https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-targets-german-christian-democratic-union/)

[2016-05] russian Cyber-espionage Group Hits Sanoma (https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/russian_cyber-espionage_group_hits_sanoma/8919118)

[2016-06] breach Of Democratic National Committee (fancy Bear Carried Out Spear-phishing Attacks On Email Addresses Associated With The Democratic National Committee In The First Quarter Of 2016. On March 10, Phishing Emails That Were Mainly Directed At Old Email Addresses Of 2008 Democratic Campaign Staffers Began To Arrive. One Of These Accounts May Have Yielded Up To Date Contact Lists. The Next Day, Phishing Attacks Expanded To The Non-public Email Addresses Of High Level Democratic Party Officials. Hillaryclinton.com Addresses Were Attacked, But Required Two Factor Authentication For Access. The Attack Redirected Towards Gmail Accounts On March 19th. Podesta�s Gmail Account Was Breached The Same Day, With 50,000 Emails Stolen. (another Sophisticated Hacking Group Attributed To The Russian Federation, Nicknamed apt 29, Cozy Bear, The Dukes Appears To Be A Different Agency, One More Interested In Traditional Long-term Espionage. (https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ (https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-google-accounts)

[2016-06] �exercise Noble Partner 2016� Spear-phishing E-mail (method: Spear-phishing E-mail (target: Usa Government (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-new-sofacy-attacks-against-us-government-agency/)

[2016-08] spear-phishing Attack Members Of The Bundestag And Multiple Political Parties Such As Linken-faction Leader Sahra Wagenknecht, Junge Union And The Cdu Of Saarland. Authorities Feared That Sensitive Information Could Be Gathered By Hackers To Later Manipulate The Public Ahead Of Elections Such As Germany�s Next Federal Election Which Was Due In September 2017. (http://www.dw.com/en/hackers-lurking-parliamentarians-told/a-19564630)

[2016-08] world Anti-doping Agency (method: Phishing Emails Sent To Users Of Its Database Claiming To Be Official Wada Communications Requesting Their Login Details. (http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/russian-hackers-fancy-bear-likely-breached-olympic-drug-testing-agency-dnc-experts-say-1577508)

[2016-09] operation �komplex� (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacys-komplex-os-x-trojan/)

[2016-10] operation �dealerschoice� (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-dealerschoice-sofacys-flash-player-exploit-platform/ (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-let-ride-sofacy-groups-dealerschoice-attacks-continue/ (the Global Reach That Coincided With This Focus On Nato And The Ukraine Couldn�t Be Overstated. Our Ksn Data Showed Spear-phishing Targets Geo-located Across The Globe Into 2017. (am, Az, Fr, De, Iq, It, Kg, Ma, Ch, Ua, Us, Vn (dealerschoice Emails, Like The One Above, That We Were Able To Recover From Third Party Sources Provided Additional Targeting Insight, And Confirmed Some Of The Targeting Within Our Ksn Data: (tr, Pl, Ba, Az, Kr, Lv, Ge, Lv, Au, Se, Be)

[2017 Early] gamefish Backdoor (target: Europe. (method: They Took Advantage Of The Syrian Military Conflict For Thematic Content And File Naming �trump�s_attack_on_syria_english.docx�. Again, This Deployment Was Likely A Part Of Their Focus On Nato Targets.)

[2017 Early] lojax: First Uefi Rootkit Found In The Wild (https://www.welivesecurity.com/2018/09/27/lojax-first-uefi-rootkit-found-wild-courtesy-sednit-group/)

[2017-02] attack On Dutch Ministries (in February 2017, The General Intelligence And Security Service (aivd) Of The Netherlands Revealed That Fancy Bear And Cozy Bear Had Made Several Attempts To Hack Into Dutch Ministries, Including The Ministry Of General Affairs, Over The Previous Six Months. Rob Bertholee, Head Of The Aivd, Said On Eenvandaag That The Hackers Were Russian And Had Tried To Gain Access To Secret Government Documents. (https://www.volkskrant.nl/cultuur-media/russen-faalden-bij-hackpogingen-ambtenaren-op-nederlandse-ministeries, B77ff391/)

[2017-02] russian Hackers �fancy Bear� Targeted French Presidential Candidate Macron (https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/ez35p7/russian-hackers-fancy-bear-targeted-french-presidential-candidate-macron)

[2017-02] iaaf Hack (the Officials Of International Association Of Athletics Federations (iaaf) Stated In April 2017 That Its Servers Had Been Hacked By The �fancy Bear� Group. The Attack Was Detected By Cybersecurity Firm Context Information Security Which Identified That An Unauthorized Remote Access To Iaaf�s Servers Had Taken Place On February 21. Iaaf Stated That The Hackers Had Accessed The Therapeutic Use Exemption Applications, Needed To Use Medications Prohibited By Wada. (https://www.voanews.com/a/iaaf-hack-fancy-bears/3793874.html)

[2017-04] german Elections (they Targeted The German Konrad Adenauer Foundation And Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Groups That Are Associated With Angela Merkel�s Christian Democratic Union And Opposition Social Democratic Party, Respectively. Fancy Bear Set Up Fake Email Servers In Late 2016 To Send Phishing Emails With Links To Malware. (https://www.handelsblatt.com/today/politics/election-risks-russia-linked-hackers-target-german-political-foundations/23569188.html?ticket=st-2696734-grhgtqukdiexesowksxo-ap1)

[2017 Early] splm Backdoor (target: Included Defense Related Commercial And Military Organizations, And Telecommunications. (targeting Included Tr, Kz, Am, Kg, Jo, Uk, Uz (method: Splm/chopstick/xagent)

[2017-06] heavy Zebrocy Deployments (targeting Profiles, Spear-phish Filenames, And Lures Carry Thematic Content Related To Visa Applications And Scanned Images, Border Control Administration, And Various Administrative Notes. Targeting Appears To Be Widely Spread Across The Middle East, Europe, And Asia: (- Business Accounting Practices And Standards (- Science And Engineering Centers (- Industrial And Hydro Chemical Engineering And Standards/certification (- Ministry Of Foreign Affairs (- Embassies And Consulates (- National Security And Intelligence Agencies (- Press Services (- Translation Services (- Ngo � Family And Social Service (- Ministry Of Energy And Industry (method: The Zebrocy Chain Follows A Pattern: Spear-phish Attachment -> Compiled Autoit Script (downloader) -> Zebrocy Payload. In Some Deployments, We Observed Sofacy Actively Developing And Deploying A New Package To A Much Smaller, Specific Subset Of Targets Within The Broader Set.)

[2017-07] apt28 Targets Hospitality Sector, Presents Threat To Travelers (https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/08/apt28-targets-hospitality-sector.html)

[2017-10] in This Case It Capitalized On The Recent Terrorist Attack In New York City. The Document Itself Is Blank. Once Opened, The Document Contacts A Control Server To Drop The First Stage Of The Malware, Seduploader, Onto A Victim�s System. (https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/apt28-threat-group-adopts-dde-technique-nyc-attack-theme-in-latest-campaign/#sf151634298)

[2017-10] russische Hackers Vallen Vredesbeweging Pax Aan (https://www.human.nl/schimmenspel/russische-hackers-vallen-nederlandse-vredesbeweging-aan.html)

[2018-01] breach Of The International Olympic Committee (on January 10, 2018, The �fancy Bears Hack Team� Online Persona Leaked What Appeared To Be Stolen International Olympic Committee (ioc) And U.s. Olympic Committee Emails, Dated From Late 2016 To Early 2017, Were Leaked In Apparent Retaliation For The Ioc�s Banning Of Russian Athletes From The 2018 Winter Olympics As A Sanction For Russia�s Systematic Doping Program. The Attack Resembles The Earlier World Anti-doping Agency (wada) Leaks. It Is Not Known Whether The Emails Are Fully Authentic, Because Of Fancy Bear�s History Of Salting Stolen Emails With Disinformation. The Mode Of Attack Was Also Not Known, But Was Probably Phishing. (https://www.wired.com/story/russian-fancy-bears-hackers-release-apparent-ioc-emails/)

[2018-02] attacks On Multiple Government Entities (target: Ministries Of Foreign Affairs Of The Usa And Romania. (method: Spear-phishing Using The Subject Line Of Upcoming Defense Events February 2018 And A Sender Address Claiming To Be From Jane�s 360 Defense Events. (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-attacks-multiple-government-entities/)

[2018-03] on March 12 And March 14, We Observed The Sofacy Group Carrying Out An Attack On A European Government Agency Involving An Updated Variant Of Dealerschoice. The Updated Dealerschoice Documents Used A Similar Process To Obtain A Malicious Flash Object From A C2 Server, But The Inner Mechanics Of The Flash Object Contained Significant Differences In Comparison To The Original Samples We Analyzed. (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-uses-dealerschoice-target-european-government-agency/)

[2018-05] breach Of The Swedish Sports Confederation (the Swedish Sports Confederation Reported Fancy Bear Was Responsible For An Attack On Its Computers, Targeting Records Of Athletes� Doping Tests. (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sweden-doping/swedish-sports-body-says-anti-doping-unit-hit-by-hacking-attack-iduskcn1ig2gn)

[2018-05] "vpnfilter Iot Botnet (thaicerts Whitepaper: (https://www.dropbox.com/s/9lkeenhveb3xbkq/whitepaper Vpnfilter Iot Botnet Seized By The Fbi.pdf?dl=0")

[2018-06] this Third Campaign Is Consistent With Two Previously Reported Attack Campaigns In Terms Of Targeting: The Targets Were Government Organizations Dealing With Foreign Affairs. In This Case However The Targets Were In Different Geopolitical Regions. (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-groups-parallel-attacks/)

[2018-08] attacks On United States Conservative Groups (the Software Company Microsoft Reported In August 2018 That The Group Had Attempted To Steal Data From Political Organizations Such As The International Republican Institute And The Hudson Institute Think Tanks. The Attacks Were Thwarted When Microsoft Security Staff Won Control Of Six Net Domains. In Its Announcement Microsoft Advised That �we Currently Have No Evidence These Domains Were Used In Any Successful Attacks Before The Dcu Transferred Control Of Them, Nor Do We Have Evidence To Indicate The Identity Of The Ultimate Targets Of Any Planned Attack Involving These Domains�. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-45257081)

[2018-10] operation �dear Joohn� (target: The Weaponized Documents Targeted Several Government Entities Around The Globe, Including North America, Europe, And A Former Ussr State. (method: New �cannon� Trojan (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/dear-joohn-sofacy-groups-global-campaign/ (https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-continues-global-attacks-wheels-new-cannon-trojan/)

[2018] brexit-themed Lure Document (brexit-themed Bait Documents To Deliver The Zekapab (also Known As Zebrocy) First-stage Malware, Sent On The Same Day The Uk Prime Minister Theresa May Announced The Initial Brexit Draft Agreement With The European Union (eu). �as The United Kingdom (uk) Prime Minister Theresa May Announced The Initial Brexit Draft Agreement With The European Union (eu). (https://www.accenture.com/t20181129t203820z__w__/us-en/_acnmedia/pdf-90/accenture-snakemackerel-delivers-zekapab-malware.pdf)

[2019-02] 2019 Think Tank Attacks (in February 2019, Microsoft Announced That It Had Detected Spear-phishing Attacks From Apt28, Aimed At Employees Of The German Marshall Fund, Aspen Institute Germany, And The German Council On Foreign Relations. Hackers From The Group Purportedly Sent Phishing E-mails To 104 Email Addresses Across Europe In An Attempt To Gain Access To Employer Credentials And Infect Sites With Malware. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/02/20/microsoft-says-it-has-found-another-russian-operation-targeting-prominent-think-tanks/?utm_term=.870ff11468ae)

[2019-02] threat Campaign Likely Targeting Nato Members, Defense And Military Outlets (idefense Assesses With Moderate Confidence That The Actors May Be Targeting Attendees And Sponsors Of The Upcoming Underwater Defense & Security 2019 Event Occurring March 5-7, 2019, In Southampton, United Kingdom. This Event Draws Attendees From Government, Military And Private Sector Entities Across The Globe. (https://www.accenture.com/t20190213t141124z__w__/us-en/_acnmedia/pdf-94/accenture-snakemackerel-threat-campaign-likely-targeting-nato-members-defense-and-military-outlets.pdf)

[2019-04] in April, Security Researchers In The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center Discovered Infrastructure Of A Known Adversary Communicating To Several External Devices. Further Research Uncovered Attempts By The Actor To Compromise Popular Iot Devices (a Voip Phone, An Office Printer, And A Video Decoder) Across Multiple Customer Locations. (https://msrc-blog.microsoft.com/2019/08/05/corporate-iot-a-path-to-intrusion/)

[2019-05] since May 2019, Pawn Storm Has Been Abusing Compromised Email Addresses To Send Credential Phishing Spam. The Majority Of The Compromised Systems Were From Defense Companies In The Middle East. Other Targets Included Organizations In The Transportation, Utilities, And Government Sectors. (https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/probing-pawn-storm-cyberespionage-campaign-through-scanning-credential-phishing-and-more)

[2019-08] on August 20th, 2019, A New Campaign Was Launched By The Group Targeting Their Usual Victims � Embassies Of, And Ministries Of Foreign Affairs In, Eastern European And Central Asian Countries. (https://www.welivesecurity.com/2019/09/24/no-summer-vacations-zebrocy/)

[2019-08] "apt28, One Of Russias Military Hacking Units, Was Most Likely Responsible For Hacking The Email Accounts Of The Norwegian Parliament, The Norwegian Police Secret Service (pst) Said Today. (https://www.zdnet.com/article/norway-says-russian-hacking-group-apt28-is-behind-august-2020-parliament-hack/")

[2019-09] at Least 16 National And International Sporting And Anti-doping Organizations Across Three Continents Were Targeted In These Attacks Which Began September 16th, Just Before News Reports About New Potential Action Being Taken By The World Anti-doping Agency. Some Of These Attacks Were Successful, But The Majority Were Not. (https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2019/10/28/cyberattacks-sporting-anti-doping/)

[2019-11] beginning In Early November Of 2019, The Main Intelligence Directorate Of The General Staff Of The Russian Army (gru) Launched A Phishing Campaign Targeting Burisma Holdings, A Holding Company Of Energy Exploration And Production Companies Based In Kiev, Ukraine. (https://cdn.area1security.com/reports/area-1-security-phishingbarismaholdings.pdf)

[2020-04] microsoft Has Tied Strontium To A Newly Uncovered Pattern Of Office365 Credential Harvesting Activity Aimed At Us And Uk Organizations Directly Involved In Political Elections. (https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2020/09/10/strontium-detecting-new-patters-credential-harvesting/)

[2020-05] pawn Storm Scanned Ip Addresses Worldwide, Including Ip Addresses From The Defense Industry In Europe, On Tcp Port 445 And 1433, Likely In An Attempt To Find Vulnerable Smb And Sql Servers Or Brute Force Credentials. (https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/20/l/pawn-storm-lack-of-sophistication-as-a-strategy.html)

[2020-08] new Cyberattacks Targeting U.s. Elections (https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2020/09/10/cyberattacks-us-elections-trump-biden/)

[2020-08] apt28 Delivers Zebrocy Malware Campaign Using Nato Theme As Lure (https://quointelligence.eu/2020/09/apt28-zebrocy-malware-campaign-nato-theme/)

[2020-11] "a Zebra In Gophers Clothing: Russian Apt Uses Covid-19 Lures To Deliver Zebrocy (https://www.intezer.com/blog/research/russian-apt-uses-covid-19-lures-to-deliver-zebrocy/")

[2021-06] a Not So Fancy Game. Exploring The New �skinnyboy� Bear�s Backdoor (https://cluster25.io/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/2021-05_fancybear.pdf)

[2021-06] hackers Exploited Mshtml Flaw To Spy On Government And Defense Targets (https://thehackernews.com/2022/01/hackers-exploited-mshtml-flaw-to-spy-on.html)

[2021-09] google Notifies 14,000 Gmail Users Of Targeted Apt28 Attacks (https://therecord.media/google-notifies-14000-gmail-users-of-targeted-apt28-attacks/)

[2022-02] fancybear/apt28, A Threat Actor Attributed To Russia Gru, Has Conducted Several Large Credential Phishing Campaigns Targeting Ukr.net Users, Ukrnet Is A Ukrainian Media Company. (https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/update-threat-landscape-ukraine/)

[2022-04] apt28 Or Fancy Bear, A Threat Actor Attributed To Russia Gru, Was Observed Targeting Users In Ukraine With A New Variant Of Malware. (https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/update-on-cyber-activity-in-eastern-europe/)

[2022-06] the Ukrainian Computer Emergency Response Team (cert) Is Warning That Russian Hacking Groups Are Exploiting The Follina Code Execution Vulnerability In New Phishing Campaigns To Install The Credomap Malware And Cobalt Strike Beacons. (https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/russian-govt-hackers-hit-ukraine-with-cobalt-strike-credomap-malware/)

[2022-09] in The Footsteps Of The Fancy Bear: Powerpoint Mouse-over Event Abused To Deliver Graphite Implants (https://blog.cluster25.duskrise.com/2022/09/23/in-the-footsteps-of-the-fancy-bear-powerpoint-graphite/