Tag: malicious
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Report: Open Source Malware Instances Increased 73% in 2025
ReversingLabs this week published a report that finds there was a 73% increase in the number of malicious open source packages discovered in 2025 compared with the previous year. More than 10,000 malicious open source packages were discovered, most of which involved node package managers (npms) that cybercriminals were using to compromise software supply chains……
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‘Semantic Chaining’ Jailbreak Dupes Gemini Nano Banana, Grok 4
Tags: maliciousIf an attacker splits a malicious prompt into discrete chunks, some large language models (LLMs) will get lost in the details and miss the true intent. First seen on darkreading.com Jump to article: www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/semantic-chaining-jailbreak-gemini-nano-banana-grok-4
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Google targets IPIDEA in crackdown on global residential proxy networks
Google disrupted IPIDEA, a major residential proxy network that enrolled users’ devices via SDKs embedded in mobile and desktop apps. Google and partners disrupted the IPIDEA residential proxy network, used by many threat actors, via legal domain takedowns, intelligence sharing on malicious SDKs, and ecosystem-wide enforcement. Google Play Protect now removes and blocks apps with…
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Apple’s new iPhone and iPad security feature limits cell networks from collecting precise location data
The new security feature makes it more difficult for police and malicious hackers to obtain a person’s precise location data from a cell phone company. First seen on techcrunch.com Jump to article: techcrunch.com/2026/01/29/apples-new-iphone-and-ipad-security-feature-limits-cell-networks-from-collecting-precise-location-data/
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eScan AV supply chain compromise: Users targeted with malicious updates
The update infrastructure for eScan antivirus, a product of Indian cybersecurity company MicroWorld Technologies, has been compromised by unknown attackers to deliver a … First seen on helpnetsecurity.com Jump to article: www.helpnetsecurity.com/2026/01/29/escan-antivirus-update-supply-chain-compromised/
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Fake “Mac Cleaner” Campaign Uses Google Ads to Redirect Users to Malware
Cybercriminals are exploiting Google Search Ads to distribute malware through deceptive landing pages that impersonate Apple’s official website design. The malicious ads appear prominently in Google Search results when users search for >>mac cleaner,<< displaying trusted domains such as docs.google.com and business.google.com as landing pages. However, clicking these ads redirects users to Google Apps Script…
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eScan Antivirus Update Server Breached to Deliver Malicious Software Updates
MicroWorld Technologies’ eScan antivirus platform fell victim to a sophisticated supply chain attack on January 20, 2026, when threat actors compromised legitimate update infrastructure to distribute multi-stage malware to enterprise and consumer endpoints worldwide. Security researchers immediately alerted the vendor, which isolated the affected infrastructure within one hour and took its global update system offline…
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Weaponized VS Code Extension “ClawdBot Agent” Spreads ScreenConnect RAT
A malicious Visual Studio Code extension posing as an AI coding assistant has been caught secretly installing a fully functional remote access tool (RAT) on developer machines. The extension looks convincing at first glance: polished branding, a professional icon, and integration with several AI providers including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Ollama, Groq, Mistral, and OpenRouter. In…
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Matanbuchus Malware Evolves to Bypass AV Defenses by Swapping Core Components
Matanbuchus is a malicious C++-based downloader that has been sold as Malware-as-a-Service (MaaS) since 2020. Initially known as a simple loader for second-stage payloads, it has steadily evolved into a flexible backdoor platform that is increasingly tied to ransomware operations. In July 2025, researchers observed Matanbuchus version 3.0 in the wild, featuring redesigned components, stronger…
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Malicious Google Ads Target Mac Users with Fake Mac Cleaner Pages
Mac users searching for software on Google or other search engines should be extra careful. First seen on hackread.com Jump to article: hackread.com/malicious-google-ads-mac-fake-mac-cleaner/
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Nation-state and criminal actors leverage WinRAR flaw in attacks
Multiple threat actors exploited a now-patched critical WinRAR flaw to gain initial access and deliver various malicious payloads. Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) revealed that multiple threat actors, including APTs and financially motivated groups, are exploiting the CVE-2025-8088 flaw in RARLAB WinRAR to establish initial access and deploy a diverse array of payloads. The WinRAR…
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Crooks are hijacking and reselling AI infrastructure: Report
Tags: access, ai, api, attack, authentication, business, cloud, communications, control, credentials, cybersecurity, data, data-breach, endpoint, exploit, firewall, group, infosec, infrastructure, intelligence, Internet, LLM, malicious, marketplace, risk, service, skills, technology, theft, threat, training, vulnerabilityexposed endpoints on default ports of common LLM inference services;unauthenticated API access without proper access controls;development/staging environments with public IP addresses;MCP servers connecting LLMs to file systems, databases and internal APIs.Common misconfigurations leveraged by these threat actors include:Ollama running on port 11434 without authentication;OpenAI-compatible APIs on port 8000 exposed to the internet;MCP servers accessible without…
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A fake romance turns into an Android spyware infection
ESET researchers have identified an Android spyware campaign that uses romance scam tactics to target individuals in Pakistan. The operation relies on a malicious app … First seen on helpnetsecurity.com Jump to article: www.helpnetsecurity.com/2026/01/29/ghostchat-android-romance-spyware/
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SolarWinds, again: Critical RCE bugs reopen old wounds for enterprise security teams
Tags: access, attack, authentication, awareness, breach, cisco, control, credentials, cve, cybersecurity, data, exploit, flaw, fortinet, infrastructure, malicious, programming, radius, rce, remote-code-execution, software, threat, update, vulnerabilityRemote code execution and data deserialization vulnerabilities CVE-2025-40551 (critical) and CVE-2025-40553 (critical);Authentication and bypass security flaws CVE-2025-40552 (critical), CVE-2025-40554 (critical), CVE-2025-40536 (high), and CVE-2025-40537 (high).CVE-2025-40551 and CVE-2025-40553 make WHD susceptible to untrusted data deseralization that could allow attackers to run commands on the host machine. The flaw could be exploited without authentication.The other two critical…
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Fortinet Confirms New Zero-Day Behind Malicious SSO Logins
To stop the ongoing attacks, the cybersecurity vendor took the drastic step of temporarily disabling FortiCloud single sign-on (SSO) authentication for all devices. First seen on darkreading.com Jump to article: www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/fortinet-new-zero-day-malicious-sso-logins
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Fake Moltbot AI Coding Assistant on VS Code Marketplace Drops Malware
Cybersecurity researchers have flagged a new malicious Microsoft Visual Studio Code (VS Code) extension for Moltbot (formerly Clawdbot) on the official Extension Marketplace that claims to be a free artificial intelligence (AI) coding assistant, but stealthily drops a malicious payload on compromised hosts.The extension, named “ClawdBot Agent – AI Coding Assistant” (“clawdbot.clawdbot-agent”) First seen on…
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LayerX Finds Malicious ChatGPT Extensions Hijack User Accounts
LayerX found malicious ChatGPT extensions hijacking user sessions to steal sensitive AI data. First seen on esecurityplanet.com Jump to article: www.esecurityplanet.com/threats/layerx-finds-malicious-chatgpt-extensions-hijack-user-accounts/
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Cybercriminals Leverage AI-Generated Malicious Job Offers to Spread PureRAT Malware
A Vietnamese threat actor is using AI-authored code to power a phishing campaign that delivers the PureRAT malware and related payloads, leveraging realistic job-themed lures to compromise corporate systems. The campaign, first documented by Trend Micro in December 2025, initially used malicious ZIP and RAR attachments posing as job opportunity documents. More recent activity observed…
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Critical FortiCloud SSO zero”‘day forces emergency service disablement at Fortinet
Attack details and indicators: Fortinet’s investigation into the exploitation revealed attackers used two specific FortiCloud accounts: “cloud-noc@mail.io” and “cloud-init@mail.io,” though the company warned “these addresses may change in the future.”Fortinet identified multiple IP addresses associated with the attacks, including several Cloudflare-protected addresses that attackers used to obscure their activities.”Following authentication via SSO, it has been…
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Fake Python Spellchecker Packages on PyPI Delivered Hidden Remote Access Trojan
Cybersecurity researchers have discovered two malicious packages in the Python Package Index (PyPI) repository that masquerade as spellcheckers but contain functionality to deliver a remote access trojan (RAT).The packages, named spellcheckerpy and spellcheckpy, are no longer available for download, but not before they were collectively downloaded a little over 1,000 times.”Hidden inside the First seen…
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Researchers Uncover 454,000+ Malicious Open Source Packages
Sonatype warns that open source threats became industrialized with a surge in malicious packages in 2025 First seen on infosecurity-magazine.com Jump to article: www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/454000-malicious-open-source/
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PackageGate bugs let attackers bypass protections in NPM, PNPM, VLT, and Bun
Koi researchers found “PackageGate” flaws in NPM, PNPM, VLT, and Bun that let attackers perform supply chain attacks and run malicious code. Security firm Koi uncovered a set of vulnerabilities collectively tracked as “PackageGate” affecting major JavaScript package managers like NPM, PNPM, VLT, and Bun. These flaws could let attackers bypass supply chain protections and…
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Microsoft Issues Emergency Patch for Active Office Zero-Day
Microsoft released an emergency Office patch to fix an actively exploited zero-day flaw that lets attackers bypass security via malicious files. The post Microsoft Issues Emergency Patch for Active Office Zero-Day appeared first on TechRepublic. First seen on techrepublic.com Jump to article: www.techrepublic.com/article/news-microsoft-office-zero-day-emergency-patch-january-2026/
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AI & the Death of Accuracy: What It Means for Zero-Trust
AI model collapse, where LLMs over time train on more and more AI-generated data and become degraded as a result, can introduce inaccuracies, promulgate malicious activity, and impact PII protections. First seen on darkreading.com Jump to article: www.darkreading.com/application-security/ai-death-accuracy-zero-trust
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‘Stanley’ Toolkit Turns Chrome Into Undetectable Phishing Vector
The malware-as-a-service kit enables malicious extensions to overlay pages on real websites without changing the visible URL, signaling a fresh challenge for enterprise security. First seen on darkreading.com Jump to article: www.darkreading.com/remote-workforce/stanley-toolkit-chrome-undetectable-phishing
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Microsoft Rushes Emergency Patch for Office Zero-Day
To exploit the vulnerability, an attacker would need either system access or be able to convince a user to open a malicious Office file. First seen on darkreading.com Jump to article: www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/microsoft-rushes-emergency-patch-office-zero-day