Malware SHARPSTATS

SHARPSTATS is a .NET backdoor used by MuddyWater since at least 2019.


List of techniques used :


id description
T1016 System Network Configuration Discovery
Adversaries may look for details about the network configuration and settings, such as IP and/or MAC addresses, of systems they access or through information discovery of remote systems. Several operating system administration utilities exist that can be used to gather this information. Examples include Arp, ipconfig/ifconfig, nbtstat, and route. Adversaries may also leverage a Network Device CLI on network devices to gather information about configurations and settings, such as IP addresses of configured interfaces and static/dynamic routes (e.g. show ip route, show ip interface). Adversaries may use the information from System Network Configuration Discovery during automated discovery to shape follow-on behaviors, including determining certain access within the target network and what actions to do next.
T1027.010 Obfuscated Files or Information: Command Obfuscation
Adversaries may obfuscate content during command execution to impede detection. Command-line obfuscation is a method of making strings and patterns within commands and scripts more difficult to signature and analyze. This type of obfuscation can be included within commands executed by delivered payloads (e.g., Phishing and Drive-by Compromise) or interactively via Command and Scripting Interpreter. For example, adversaries may abuse syntax that utilizes various symbols and escape characters (such as spacing, `^`, `+`. `$`, and `%`) to make commands difficult to analyze while maintaining the same intended functionality. Many languages support built-in obfuscation in the form of base64 or URL encoding. Adversaries may also manually implement command obfuscation via string splitting (`“Wor”+“d.Application”`), order and casing of characters (`rev
T1033 System Owner/User Discovery
Adversaries may attempt to identify the primary user, currently logged in user, set of users that commonly uses a system, or whether a user is actively using the system. They may do this, for example, by retrieving account usernames or by using OS Credential Dumping. The information may be collected in a number of different ways using other Discovery techniques, because user and username details are prevalent throughout a system and include running process ownership, file/directory ownership, session information, and system logs. Adversaries may use the information from System Owner/User Discovery during automated discovery to shape follow-on behaviors, including whether or not the adversary fully infects the target and/or attempts specific actions. Various utilities and commands may acquire this information, including whoami. In macOS and Linux, the currently logged in user can be identified with w and who. On macOS the dscl . list /Users | grep -v '_' command can also be used to enumerate user accounts. Environment variables, such as %USERNAME% and $USER, may also be used to access this information. On network devices, Network Device CLI commands such as `show users` and `show ssh` can be used to display users currently logged into the device.
T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell
Adversaries may abuse PowerShell commands and scripts for execution. PowerShell is a powerful interactive command-line interface and scripting environment included in the Windows operating system. Adversaries can use PowerShell to perform a number of actions, including discovery of information and execution of code. Examples include the Start-Process cmdlet which can be used to run an executable and the Invoke-Command cmdlet which runs a command locally or on a remote computer (though administrator permissions are required to use PowerShell to connect to remote systems). PowerShell may also be used to download and run executables from the Internet, which can be executed from disk or in memory without touching disk. A number of PowerShell-based offensive testing tools are available, including Empire, PowerSploit, PoshC2, and PSAttack. PowerShell commands/scripts can also be executed without directly invoking the powershell.exe binary through interfaces to PowerShell's underlying System.Management.Automation assembly DLL exposed through the .NET framework and Windows Common Language Interface (CLI).
T1082 System Information Discovery
An adversary may attempt to get detailed information about the operating system and hardware, including version, patches, hotfixes, service packs, and architecture. Adversaries may use the information from System Information Discovery during automated discovery to shape follow-on behaviors, including whether or not the adversary fully infects the target and/or attempts specific actions. Tools such as Systeminfo can be used to gather detailed system information. If running with privileged access, a breakdown of system data can be gathered through the systemsetup configuration tool on macOS. As an example, adversaries with user-level access can execute the df -aH command to obtain currently mounted disks and associated freely available space. Adversaries may also leverage a Network Device CLI on network devices to gather detailed system information (e.g. show version). System Information Discovery combined with information gathered from other forms of discovery and reconnaissance can drive payload development and concealment. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) cloud providers such as AWS, GCP, and Azure allow access to instance and virtual machine information via APIs. Successful authenticated API calls can return data such as the operating system platform and status of a particular instance or the model view of a virtual machine.
T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer
Adversaries may transfer tools or other files from an external system into a compromised environment. Tools or files may be copied from an external adversary-controlled system to the victim network through the command and control channel or through alternate protocols such as ftp. Once present, adversaries may also transfer/spread tools between victim devices within a compromised environment (i.e. Lateral Tool Transfer). On Windows, adversaries may use various utilities to download tools, such as `copy`, `finger`, certutil, and PowerShell commands such as IEX(New-Object Net.WebClient).downloadString() and Invoke-WebRequest. On Linux and macOS systems, a variety of utilities also exist, such as `curl`, `scp`, `sftp`, `tftp`, `rsync`, `finger`, and `wget`. Adversaries may also abuse installers and package managers, such as `yum` or `winget`, to download tools to victim hosts. Adversaries have also abused file application features, such as the Windows `search-ms` protocol handler, to deliver malicious files to victims through remote file searches invoked by User Execution (typically after interacting with Phishing lures). Files can also be transferred using various Web Services as well as native or otherwise present tools on the victim system. In some cases, adversaries may be able to leverage services that sync between a web-based and an on-premises client, such as Dropbox or OneDrive, to transfer files onto victim systems. For example, by compromising a cloud account and logging into the service's web portal, an adversary may be able to trigger an automatic syncing process that transfers the file onto the victim's machine.
T1124 System Time Discovery
An adversary may gather the system time and/or time zone settings from a local or remote system. The system time is set and stored by services, such as the Windows Time Service on Windows or systemsetup on macOS. These time settings may also be synchronized between systems and services in an enterprise network, typically accomplished with a network time server within a domain. System time information may be gathered in a number of ways, such as with Net on Windows by performing net time \hostname to gather the system time on a remote system. The victim's time zone may also be inferred from the current system time or gathered by using w32tm /tz. In addition, adversaries can discover device uptime through functions such as GetTickCount() to determine how long it has been since the system booted up. On network devices, Network Device CLI commands such as `show clock detail` can be used to see the current time configuration. In addition, system calls – such as time() – have been used to collect the current time on Linux devices. On macOS systems, adversaries may use commands such as systemsetup -gettimezone or timeIntervalSinceNow to gather current time zone information or current date and time. This information could be useful for performing other techniques, such as executing a file with a Scheduled Task/Job, or to discover locality information based on time zone to assist in victim targeting (i.e. System Location Discovery). Adversaries may also use knowledge of system time as part of a time bomb, or delaying execution until a specified date/time.

List of groups using the malware :


id description
G0069 MuddyWater
MuddyWater is a cyber espionage group assessed to be a subordinate element within Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS). Since at least 2017, MuddyWater has targeted a range of government and private organizations across sectors, including telecommunications, local government, defense, and oil and natural gas organizations, in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Europe, and North America.

© 2022 The MITRE Corporation. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of The MITRE Corporation.