Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2011/08/11/gov_officials_gmail_targeted/
Spear phishers renew attack on feds' Gmail
Gov officials (still) stalked
Posted in Security, 11th August 2011 18:51 GMT
A targeted campaign to collect Gmail passwords from senior US government officials and military personnel is showing no signs of letting up more than two months after Google first warned it had already snared hundreds of victims.
According to independent security researcher Mila Parkour, the same attackers sent a new round of highly targeted spear phishing emails as recently as last week that attempted to trick government workers into revealing credentials for their personal Gmail accounts. As was the case in early June the attackers' goal is to monitor the private email of people working in sensitive government and military positions.
“I am posting this only to highlight the fact that once compromises happen and are covered in the news, they do not disappear and attackers don't give up or stop,” Parkour wrote in a blog post published on Thursday. “They continue their business as usual.”
The emails in the latest spear phishing wave contain links that are customized for each recipient, and the sender is forged to appear as a close associate of the receiver. The message is designed to look like a subscription form for a publication that requires authentication using credentials for a Google account.
Parkour tested the attack by responding to an email using an account that closely resembled one of the targeted recipients. To make it appear authentic, she loaded it with Google alerts about human rights and military issues and mail from Chinese-related Google groups. She also changed some of the links in the form to match the account she had set up. The form then sent the phished password to a compromised server for www.softechglobal.com, which is hosted by ThePlanet.com.
Less than two hours later, someone using IP addresses belonging to the Tor anonymity service logged in to the dummy account.
Parkour's update is yet another testament to the determination of the attackers to penetrate the inner circles of high-ranking government and military personnel and once successful, to stay there for as long as possible. The spear phishers have stalked some of their previous victims for more almost a year and in some cases sent the victims emails designed to originate from colleagues in hopes of getting responses that detailed the targets' schedules, contacts, and job responsibilities. ®