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THE DAILY INDEX

Technology, AI, software, security, crypto and business

ATTACKS & VULNERABILITIES

TLDR InfoSec

GAME ENGINES: AN UNDETECTED PLAYGROUND FOR MALWARE LOADERS

Check Point researchers have detected a new malware campaign that has infected over 17K machines since late June. The new campaign uses the Godot cross-platform gaming engine to execute GDScript code, which can trigger the GodLoader malware loader. The current variant of this malware employs several sandbox-evasion techniques such as checking for the presence of 3D acceleration and checking for the amount of free space available. After infection, the script adds the full C:\\ disk to the Microsoft Defender exclusion list and then downloads further malware from Bitbucket. The current variant targets Windows systems but Check Point researchers have provided PoCs for Linux and macOS.

EDR SILENCERS AND BEYOND: EXPLORING METHODS TO BLOCK EDR COMMUNICATION - PART 1

This article discusses a novel technique that blocks EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response) communications by manipulating the Windows Name Resolution Policy Table (NRPT) to redirect DNS queries for EDR domains to localhost or invalid IP addresses. The NRPT method can effectively prevent Microsoft Defender for Endpoint from sending data by manipulating DNS resolution, though it requires administrative permissions. The article also covers detection opportunities through PowerShell command execution and registry changes and suggests mitigation strategies for EDR vendors such as monitoring NRPT changes and implementing backup IP addresses for critical FQDNs.

PHISHING-RESISTANT MFA SUCCESS STORY: USDA'S FIDO IMPLEMENTATION

The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) primarily uses personal identity verification (PIV) cards for authentication but found that it could not solely rely on PIV cards for situations like when there were temporary employees or for the waiting period before a PIV card can be issued. To solve these issues, users were originally given an exception policy that allowed for username and password login, which was phishing prone. To improve its systems, USDA leveraged a centralized Entra ID system to roll out FIDO MFA using either Windows Hello for Business or FIPS-140 security keys. Leveraging FIDO + SSO allowed the USDA to protect over 600 applications through gradual organizational maturity.

IMPORTANT CHANGES TO CLOUDTRAIL EVENTS FOR IAM IDENTITY CENTER

AWS IAM Identity Center is streamlining its CloudTrail events to simplify user identification in CloudTrail and enhance the correlation between IAM Identity Center users and external directory services like Okta or Microsoft Active Directory. Specifically, IAM Identity Center will replace userName and principalID fields under the user identity element in CloudTrail events with the user ID and Identity Store ARN when a user signs into the console or accesses the AWS CLI. IAM Identity Center will also be omitting the value of a group's display name in CloudTrail events when a group is created or updated. Specific examples and transition guidance are provided in the blog post.

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