MOVEit Transfer Software Exploited Through Critical Zero Day Vulnerability 2023

The Critical Zero-Day: CVE-2023-34362

Ipswitch, a subsidiary of Progress Software Corporation, has been hit by a major cybersecurity vulnerability exploited by unknown hackers to attack its MOVEit Transfer software. The software is a popular application for businesses and customers to transfer data securely. Identified as CVE-2023-34362 – a zero-day vulnerability – Progress Software Corporation has issued a critical security advisory warning its customers to take precautionary measures immediately.

The software developer advises all its customers to restrict access to external traffic to ports 80 and 443 on MOVEit Transfer servers until patches have been installed. While Progress notes that the recommendation is necessary, it also concedes that it will affect the operations of certain applications such as MOVEit Automation tasks, API functions, and the plugin functionality of the Outlook MOVEit Transfer.

Vulnerable to SQL injection that leads to remote code execution, cybersecurity company, Rapid7, has identified the zero-day flaw in the software. With approximately 2,500 exposed servers, primarily in the United States, Rapid7 notes a common feature of all exploited devices is the ‘human2.asp’ webshell, which can execute a series of commands if accessed with the correct password. Scarily, these commands enable the attacker to retrieve vast amounts of data from the server, such as lists of stored files, user details, and Azure Blob Storage account configurations.

Reportedly several admins have reported discovering multiple unexpected files post-breach. What is worrying is that the breach likely began over the long Memorial Day weekend in the United States when system monitoring is often at its minimum.

With a potential for data theft and exposure, cybersecurity experts are warning organizations to shut down their MOVEit Transfers until the issue is resolved and a comprehensive investigation for compromise has been conducted.

Charles Carmakal, CTO of Mandiant, strongly suggests that all organizations using MOVEit Transfer should acquire a forensic examination to ascertain whether their system was compromised and if data was stolen. Furthermore, Progress Software has confirmed that its cloud platform was impacted, potentially broadening the scope of victims. The company has released mitigation steps for on-premise and cloud-based systems, and experts recommend organizations follow them.

Microsoft has attributed the attacks exploiting the CVE-2023-34362 MOVEit Transfer 0-day vulnerability to Lace Tempest, known for ransomware operations and running the infamous Clop extortion site. The software giant has also published articles with IOCs, detections, and hunting guidance and will continue to monitor the situation with stakeholders.

Second MFT 0-Day in Six Months

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The zero day vulnerability in the GoAnywhere file-sharing software is tracked with the code CVE-2023-0669 and was first discovered on February 3, 2023. On February 6, 2023, an exploit code was released for this vulnerability, and by February 10, 2023, Cl0p operators had announced that they had used the exploit to attack 130 organizations… [Read More]

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