State-Sponsored
State actor targets 155 countries in ‘Shadow Campaigns’ espionage op
A state-sponsored threat group has compromised dozens of networks of government and critical infrastructure entities in 37 countries in global-scale operations dubbed ‘Shadow Campaigns’. Between November and December last year, the actor also engaged in reconnaissance activity targeting government entities connected to 155 countries. According to Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42 division, the group has […]
Notepad++ update feature hijacked by Chinese state hackers for months
Chinese state-sponsored threat actors were likely behind the hijacking of Notepad++ update traffic last year that lasted for almost half a year, the developer states in an official announcement today. The attackers intercepted and selectively redirected update requests from certain users to malicious servers, serving tampered update manifests by exploiting a security gap in the Notepad++ update […]
Sandworm hackers linked to failed wiper attack on Poland’s energy systems
A cyberattack targeting Poland’s power grid in late December 2025 has been linked to the Russian state-sponsored hacking group Sandworm, which attempted to deploy a new destructive data-wiping malware dubbed DynoWiper during the attack.. Sandworm (also tracked as UAC-0113, APT44, and Seashell Blizzard) is a Russian nation-state hacking group that has been active since 2009. […]
SonicWall says state-sponsored hackers behind September security breach
SonicWall’s investigation into the September security breach that exposed customers’ firewall configuration backup files concludes that state-sponsored hackers were behind the attack. The network security company says that incident responders from Mandiant confirmed that the malicious activity had no impact on SonicWall’s products, firmware, systems, tools, source code, or customer networks. “The Mandiant investigation is now […]
MuddyWater’s DarkBit ransomware cracked for free data recovery
Cybersecurity firm Profero cracked the encryption of the DarkBit ransomware gang’s encryptors, allowing them to recover a victim’s files for free without paying a ransom. This occurred in 2023 during an incident response handled by Profero experts, who were brought in to investigate a ransomware attack on one of their clients, which had encrypted multiple […]
BadPilot network hacking campaign fuels Russian SandWorm attacks
A subgroup of the Russian state-sponsored hacking group APT44, also known as ‘Seashell Blizzard’ and ‘Sandworm’, has been targeting critical organizations and governments in a multi-year campaign dubbed ‘BadPilot.’ The threat actor has been active since at least 2021 and is also responsible for breaching networks of organizations in energy, oil and gas, telecommunications, shipping, and […]
Google says hackers abuse Gemini AI to empower their attacks
Multiple state-sponsored groups are experimenting with the AI-powered Gemini assistant from Google to increase productivity and to conduct research on potential infrastructure for attacks or for reconnaissance on targets. Google’s Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) detected government-linked advanced persistent threat (APT) groups using Gemini primarily for productivity gains rather than to develop or conduct novel AI-enabled cyberattacks that can […]
North Korean govt hackers linked to Play ransomware attack
The North Korean state-sponsored hacking group tracked as ‘Andariel’ has been linked to the Play ransomware operation, using the RaaS to work behind the scenes and evade sanctions. A report from Palo Alto Networks and its Unit 42 researchers claims that Andariel might be either an affiliate of Play or acting as an initial access broker […]
Dutch Police: ‘State actor’ likely behind recent data breach
The national Dutch police (Politie) says that a state actor was likely behind the data breach it detected last week. The attack compromised police office contact details, names, email addresses, phone numbers, and in some cases, private details. According to the original report, the attacker had hacked a police account and stole work-related contact details of […]
Hackers now use AppDomain Injection to drop CobaltStrike beacons
A wave of attacks that started in July 2024 rely on a less common technique called AppDomain Manager Injection, which can weaponize any Microsoft .NET application on Windows. The technique has been around since 2017, and multiple proof-of-concept apps have been released over the years. However, it is typically used in red team engagements and seldomly observed in […]