Threats Tagged 'anydesk'

Kimsuky conducted spear phishing campaigns against South Korean and Japanese targets during the first half of 2026, distributing LNK malware through OneDrive share links. The malicious files established scheduled tasks that periodically fetched PowerShell scripts from command-and-control servers to profile systems, exfiltrate Thunderbird and Outlook email data, and log keystrokes. The threat actor installed legitimate remote control software including Chrome Remote Desktop and AnyDesk to evade antivirus detection and maintain multiple access channels. A malicious Chrome extension designed to steal Gmail data exhibited characteristics of AI-generated code, featuring Korean comments, debug strings, and Unicode emoji throughout. The operation employed rotating infrastructure and compromised legitimate Korean servers as command-and-control nodes to impede tracking efforts.

MediumCampaignJapan#spear phishing#chrome remote desktop#powershell

An Akira ransomware affiliate gained initial access through an exposed SonicWall VPN without multi-factor authentication via credential spraying. After compromising the domain controller, the attacker performed Active Directory enumeration, collected and exfiltrated data using WinRAR and s5cmd to cloud storage. The affiliate employed a novel evasion technique by rebooting the victim host into Safe Mode with Networking to disable EDR and antivirus protection. AnyDesk was installed as a persistent remote access mechanism. However, the Safe Mode environment caused the ransomware to fail due to out-of-virtual-memory errors, preventing encryption. Despite the encryption failure, the attacker had already exfiltrated credentials and file shares, enabling extortion through data leak threats. This marks the first observed instance of Akira affiliates using Safe Mode boot as an anti-EDR technique.