VB Blog

VB2017 video: Turning Trickbot: decoding an encrypted command-and-control channel

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Nov 3, 2017

Trickbot, a banking trojan which appeared this year, seems to be a new, more modular, and more extensible malware descendant of the notorious Dyre botnet trojan. At VB2017, Symantec researcher Andrew Brandt presented a walkthrough of a typical Trickbot infection process, and its aftermath, as seen through the lens of a tool used to perform man-in-the-middle decryption. Today, we publish both Andrew's slides and the recording of his presentation.

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Paper: FAME - Friendly Malware Analysis Framework

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Nov 2, 2017

Today, we publish a short paper in which CERT Société Générale presents FAME, its open source malware analysis framework.

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Ebury and Mayhem server malware families still active

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 31, 2017

Ebury and Mayhem, two families of Linux server malware, about which VB published papers back in 2014, are still active and have received recent updates.

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VB2017 paper: Crypton - exposing malware's deepest secrets

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 27, 2017

Crypton, a tool developed by F5 Networks researchers Julia Karpin and Anna Dorfman, aims to speed up the reverse engineering process by decrypting encrypted content found in a (malicious) binary. The researchers described the tool in a paper which they presented at VB2017 in Madrid. Today, we publish both the paper and the recording of their presentation.

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VB2017 paper: The sprawling market of consumer spyware

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 25, 2017

For many people, the threat of an abusive partner or ex-partner is very real - and the market for consumer spyware worryingly large. Today, we publish the recording of a presentation on the subject of consumer spyware given at VB2017 by The Daily Beast reporter Joseph Cox.

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Gábor Szappanos wins fourth Péter Szőr Award

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 23, 2017

At the VB2017 gala dinner, the fourth Péter Szőr Award was presented to Sophos researcher Gábor Szappanos for his paper "AKBuilder – the crowdsourced exploit kit".

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VB2017 paper: Walking in your enemy's shadow: when fourth-party collection becomes attribution hell

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 20, 2017

We publish the VB2017 paper and video by Kaspersky Lab researchers Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade and Costin Raiu, in which they look at fourth-party collection (spies spying on other spies' campaigns) and its implications for attribution.

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Didn't come to VB2017? Tell us why!

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 11, 2017

Virus Bulletin is a company - and a conference - with a mission: to further the research in and facilitate the fight against digital threats. To help us in this mission, we want to hear from those who didn't come to Madrid. What is your impression of the VB Conference? What did you think of this year's programme? And why couldn't you come to Madrid?

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Montreal will host VB2018

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Oct 10, 2017

Last week, we announced the full details of VB2018, which will take place 3-5 October 2018 at the Fairmont The Queen Elizabeth hotel in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

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VB2017 preview: Beyond lexical and PDNS (guest blog)

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Oct 5, 2017

In a special guest blog post, VB2017 Silver sponsor Cisco Umbrella writes about a paper that researchers Dhia Mahjoub and David Rodriguez will present at the conference this Friday.

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VB2006 a resounding success - VB2007 dates revealed

As another VB conference comes to a close, dates for next year's conference are revealed.
As another VB conference comes to a close, dates for next year's conference are revealed. VB2006, which took place in Montréal last week has been declared a resounding success by… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/resounding-success-dates-revealed/

McAfee stock scandal claims bosses

CEO leaves, president fired over financial problems.
CEO leaves, president fired over financial problems. Investigations into irregularities in McAfee's finances have led to the resignation of the company CEO and board chairman… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/mcafee-stock-scandal-claims-bosses/

Met warns Haxdoor victims

Police notify 2,300 their details have been stolen.
Police notify 2,300 their details have been stolen. London's Metropolitan Police has contacted over 2,300 computer users to inform them that their details have been found on a… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/met-warns-haxdoor-victims/

Domain name threat to Spamhaus

Anti-spam system at risk of losing identity.
Anti-spam system at risk of losing identity. The recent case in which a US court found anti-spam organisation Spamhaus guilty of mislabelling a company as spammers may take a… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/domain-name-threat-spamhaus/

False false positives

BitDefender defends reputation, three more VB100% awards granted.
BitDefender defends reputation, three more VB100% awards granted. Since the publication of the recent VB100% results, several of the files from the clean test set causing false… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/false-false-positives/

Hormel denied spam copyright

EU court rejects trademark dispute.
EU court rejects trademark dispute.Hormel Foods, maker of the SPAM pressed meat product, has lost a case brought before the European 'Office for Harmonization of Internal Markets'… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/hormel-denied-spam-copyright/

Eight years for Russian DoS blackmailers

Extortion gang sentenced for gambling site attacks.
Extortion gang sentenced for gambling site attacks. A team of three found guilty of computer crimes and extortion have been sentenced to eight years imprisonment by a Russian… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/eight-years-russian-dos-blackmailers/

Tesco to sell budget AV product

UK supermarket giant enters software market.
UK supermarket giant enters software market. The UK's largest supermarket chain, Tesco, has announced plans to sell and support its own-brand range of low-budget software products,… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/tesco-sell-budget-av-product/

Stration worm building steadily

Mass-mailer evolving as botnets spread.
Mass-mailer evolving as botnets spread. The Stration mass-mailing worm, also called Warezov by some vendors, has been spreading steadily over the last few weeks, with the creators… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/stration-worm-building-steadily/

McAfee joins Vista battle

Newspaper ad attacks Microsoft plans.
Newspaper ad attacks Microsoft plans.McAfee has joined Symantec on the warpath against Microsoft's plans for its forthcoming Vista release of Windows. In a full-page advertisement… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/mcafee-joins-vista-battle/

Gmail slashes spam FPs

Hotmail lagging behind on mislabelled ham.
Hotmail lagging behind on mislabelled ham. 'Email marketing' firm Lyris has released a study of spam false positive filtering, showing a general downward trend in falsely blocked… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/gmail-slashes-spam-fps/

Web community fights phishing

Vote-based anti-phish system launched.
Vote-based anti-phish system launched. A new database of phishing sites has been launched, with an open-source, community focus. The system, labelled PhishTank, is run by web firm… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/web-community-fights-phishing/

Trend, McAfee vulnerabilities disclosed

ActiveX and ePO flaws covered by patches.
ActiveX and ePO flaws covered by patches.Trend Micro's flagship OfficeScan Corporate Edition 7.3 has suffered a vulnerability, allowing code execution from the local network. The… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/trend-mcafee-vulnerabilities-disclosed/

NCSA launches security month

Watchdog kicks off awareness offensive.
Watchdog kicks off awareness offensive. US online safety organisation the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) has launched its latest public information campaign, labelling… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/ncsa-launches-security-month/

More spammers nabbed by Earthlink

ISP helps FBI track down spamming duo.
ISP helps FBI track down spamming duo. Two men pleaded guilty to spamming in a Miami court last week. The pair were accused of sending over 25,000 emails over a period of a month… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/more-spammers-nabbed-earthlink/

IE punctured yet again

Newly patched browser vulnerable to more malware.
Newly patched browser vulnerable to more malware.Microsoft's beleaguered Internet Explorer browser is once again the subject of security worries, as another fully functioning… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/ie-punctured-yet-again/

Phishers indicted

Six men charged with masterminding a phishing operation.
Six men charged with masterminding a phishing operation. Six US men have been indicted on charges of masterminding a phishing operation. According to the indictment, the six men… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/phishers-indicted/

News round-up

September's goings on in the AV industry.
September's goings on in the AV industry. The top news stories of September were undoubtedly those concerning the VML vulnerability in Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Not only was… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/news-round/

October

Anti-virus and security related news provided by independent anti-virus advisors, Virus Bulletin
https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/

October issue of VB published

The October issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to download.
The October issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to download. The October 2006 issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to browse online or… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/10/october-issue-vb-published/

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