Reported by Colin Domoney Must Read Article1-Aug-25-2023-01-31-48-4868-PM (APIsecurity.io) Great article

This week, we have news of the so-called GhostToken vulnerability, which could allow attackers to target Google Cloud users via the application marketplace. According to the researchers at Astrix who discovered the vulnerability, it could have allowed attackers to access the target account’s Google Drive, Calendar, Photos, Google Docs, Google Maps, and other Google Cloud Platform services. The researchers reported their findings to Google in June 2022, Google accepted them in August 2022, and in April 2023, they released a global patch to address the issue. Researchers also recommended that Google Cloud users regularly verify the application installed on their instance using the application management page on the Google Cloud portal.

The root cause of the vulnerability relates to the manner in which Google Cloud manages the lifecycle of an application and, specifically, how the application’s associated OAuth2 tokens are managed. The Google Cloud provides a 30-day grace period from the time an application is scheduled for deletion until the time it is permanently deleted. This grace period is to allow administrators an opportunity to recover resources deleted in error. While in the pending deletion state, the application (and its associated resources such as OAuth2 tokens) are invisible to platform users. The researchers at Astrix discovered that if an application’s pending deletion was canceled within the 30-day window, then the application and all its associated resources would be restored. They tested this with an OAuth2 token and discovered that this token still provided access to its original resources.

They describe how this delete/pending deletion/cancel deletion loop can be used to effectively hide a rogue application from the application management page of a user’s Google Cloud portal, using the following attack flow:

Article (https://apisecurity.io/issue-227-ghosttoken-on-google-cloud-gartner-on-zero-trust-api-authentication/?_hsmi=271737197&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9IfgoA5y7vMToerm-_dYKoPrJLUPxYuxFbM8t5n55gQjVb4nUIY4VGKXjHA1ZcwroZuWFiAt3S0OtpnQcQ2GvjR9SmAA)

Roy Miehe | MspPortal Partners Inc. | Ceo/President
Security Software Distributor: Bitdefender , Barracuda, Axcient
“Where Service and Technical Skills Count”

Sounds like what could happen to Microsoft O365 and they have no liability (there are inexpensive backup solutions available)

By Bill Toulas August 23, 2023 10:40 AM (great reporting)
Danish hosting firms CloudNordic and AzeroCloud have suffered ransomware attacks, causing the loss of the majority of customer data and forcing the hosting providers to shut down all systems, including websites, email, and customer sites.

The two brands belong to the same company and stated that the attack unfolded last Friday night. However, today’s operational status remains highly problematic, with the firm’s IT teams only managing to restore some servers without any data.

Moreover, the firm’s statement clarifies that it won’t be paying the threat actors a ransom and has already engaged with security experts and reported the incident to the police.

Unfortunately, the system and data restoration process isn’t going smoothly, and CloudNordic says many of its customers have lost data that appears to be irrecoverable.

“Since we neither can nor wish to meet the financial demands of the criminal hackers for a ransom, CloudNordic’s IT team and external experts have been working intensively to assess the damage and determine what could be recovered,” reads CloudNordic’s statement (machine translated)

“Sadly, it has been impossible to recover more data, and the majority of our customers have consequently lost all their data with us.”

Both public notices include instructions on recovering websites and services from local backups or Wayback Machine archives.

Given the situation, the two hosting service providers previously recommended that heavily impacted customers move to other providers, such as Powernet and Nordicway.

Article (https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/hosting-firm-says-it-lost-all-customer-data-after-ransomware-attack/)

Roy Miehe | MspPortal Partners Inc. | Ceo/President

Security Software Distributor: Bitdefender , Barracuda, Axcient

“Where Service and Technical Skills Count”

By Lawrence Abrams August 21, 2023 01:52 PM

A legitimate-looking ad for Amazon in Google search results redirects visitors to a Microsoft Defender tech support scam that locks up their browser.
Today, BleepingComputer was alerted to what appeared to be a valid advertisement for Amazon in the Google search results.
The advertisement shows Amazon’s legitimate URL, just like in the company’s typical search result, as shown below.

These tech support scams will automatically go into full-screen mode, making it hard to get out of the page without terminating the Google Chrome process.
However, when Chrome is terminated in this way, on the relaunch, it will prompt users to restore the previously closed pages, reopening the tech support scam.
A demonstration of today’s fake Amazon Google ad leading to the tech support scam site can be seen below

Google ads abused to distribute malware
BleepingComputer reached out to both Google and Amazon regarding this malvertising but has not received a response at the time of this publication.
Google advertisements have been heavily abused over the past year by other threat actors to distribute malware, which sometimes leads to ransomware attacks.
The threat actors would create replicas of legitimate sites but swap the download links to distribute trojanized programs that install malware.
The Royal ransomware operation also creates Google advertisements promoting malicious sites that install Cobalt Strike beacons. These beacons are used to provide initial access to corporate networks to conduct ransomware attacks.

Article (https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/sneaky-amazon-google-ad-leads-to-microsoft-support-scam/)

Roy Miehe | MspPortal Partners Inc. | Ceo/President
Security Software Distributor: Bitdefender , Barracuda, Axcient

By Sergiu Gatlan June 23, 2023 02:06 PM

Federal agencies ordered to patch by July 14th

Today, CISA ordered federal agencies to patch recently patched security vulnerabilities exploited as zero-days to deploy Triangulation spyware on iPhones via iMessage zero-click exploits.

The warning comes after Kaspersky published a report detailing a Triangulation malware component used in a campaign it tracks as “Operation Triangulation.”

Kaspersky says it found the spyware on iPhones belonging to employees in its Moscow office and from other countries. The attacks started in 2019 and are still ongoing, according to the company, and they use iMessage zero-click exploits that exploit the now-patched iOS zero-day bugs.

Russia’s FSB intelligence agency also claimed that Apple collaborated with the NSA to create a backdoor, facilitating the infiltration of iPhones in Russia. The FSB also said it allegedly found thousands of infected iPhones owned by Russian government officials and embassy staff in Israel, China, and NATO member nations.

“We have never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and never will,” an Apple spokesperson told BleepingComputer.

“Apple is aware of a report that this issue may have been actively exploited against versions of iOS released before iOS 15.7,” the company said on Wednesday when describing the two Kernel and WebKit vulnerabilities (CVE-2023-32434 and CVE-2023-32435) exploited in the attacks.

The company also fixed a WebKit zero-day (CVE-2023-32439) this week that can let attackers gain arbitrary code execution on unpatched devices. This was also tagged by CISA today as an actively exploited flaw.

The list of affected devices is extensive, as the zero-day affects older and newer models, and it includes:

iPhone 8 and later, iPad Pro (all models), iPad Air 3rd generation and later, iPad 5th generation and later, iPad mini 5th generation and later
iPhone 6s (all models), iPhone 7 (all models), iPhone SE (1st generation), iPad Air 2, iPad mini (4th generation), and iPod touch (7th generation)
Macs running macOS Big Sur, Monterey, and Ventura
Apple Watch Series 4 and later, Apple Watch Series 3, Series 4, Series 5, Series 6, Series 7, and SE
On Thursday, Apple sent another round of threat notifications alerting customers they were targeted in state-sponsored attacks, one day after patching the zero-days exploited to deploy Triangulation spyware. However, it’s not clear to what incidents these new warnings are related to, according to CNN reporter Chris Bing.

Article Link (https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/cisa-orders-agencies-to-patch-iphone-bugs-abused-in-skspyware-attac/)

Roy Miehe | MspPortal Partners Inc. | Ceo/President
Security Software Distributor: Bitdefender , Barracuda, Axcient
“Where Service and Technical Skills Count”