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J O I N T AN AL Y S I S R E P O R T
DISCLAIMER: This report is provided “as is” for informational purposes only. The Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained within. DHS
does not endorse any commercial product or service referenced in this advisory or otherwise. This document is
distributed as TLP:WHITE: Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed
without restriction. For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see https://www.us-cert.gov/tlp.
Reference Number: JAR-16-20296
December 29, 2016
GRIZZLY STEPPE – Russian Malicious Cyber Activity
Summary
This Joint Analysis Report (JAR) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of
Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). This document
provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and
military intelligence Services (RIS) to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints
associated with the U.S. election, as well as a range of U.S. Government, political, and private
sector entities. The U.S. Government is referring to this malicious cyber activity by RIS as
GRIZZLY STEPPE.
Previous JARs have not attributed malicious cyber activity to specific countries or threat actors.
However, public attribution of these activities to RIS is supported by technical indicators from
the U.S. Intelligence Community, DHS, FBI, the private sector, and other entities. This
determination expands upon the Joint Statement released October 7, 2016, from the Department
of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security.
This activity by RIS is part of an ongoing campaign of cyber-enabled operations directed at the
U.S. government and its citizens. These cyber operations have included spearphishing campaigns
targeting government organizations, critical infrastructure entities, think tanks, universities,
political organizations, and corporations leading to the theft of information. In foreign countries,
RIS actors conducted damaging and/or disruptive cyber-attacks, including attacks on critical
infrastructure networks. In some cases, RIS actors masqueraded as third parties, hiding behind
false online personas designed to cause the victim to misattribute the source of the attack. This
JAR provides technical indicators related to many of these operations, recommended mitigations,
suggested actions to take in response to the indicators provided, and information on how to
report such incidents to the U.S. Government.
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Description
The U.S. Government confirms that two different RIS actors participated in the intrusion into a
U.S. political party. The first actor group, known as Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) 29,
entered into the party’s systems in summer 2015, while the second, known as APT28, entered in
spring 2016.
Figure 1: The tactics and techniques used by APT29 and APT 28 to conduct cyber intrusions against target systems
Both groups have historically targeted government organizations, think tanks, universities, and
corporations around the world. APT29 has been observed crafting targeted spearphishing
campaigns leveraging web links to a malicious dropper; once executed, the code delivers Remote
Access Tools (RATs) and evades detection using a range of techniques. APT28 is known for
leveraging domains that closely mimic those of targeted organizations and tricking potential
victims into entering legitimate credentials. APT28 actors relied heavily on shortened URLs in
their spearphishing email campaigns. Once APT28 and APT29 have access to victims, both
groups exfiltrate and analyze information to gain intelligence value. These groups use this
information to craft highly targeted spearphishing campaigns. These actors set up operational
infrastructure to obfuscate their source infrastructure, host domains and malware for targeting
organizations, establish command and control nodes, and harvest credentials and other valuable
information from their targets.
In summer 2015, an APT29 spearphishing campaign directed emails containing a malicious link
to over 1,000 recipients, including multiple U.S. Government victims. APT29 used legitimate
domains, to include domains associated with U.S. organizations and educational institutions, to
host malware and send spearphishing emails. In the course of that campaign, APT29 successfully
compromised a U.S. political party. At least one targeted individual activated links to malware
hosted on operational infrastructure of opened attachments containing malware. APT29
delivered malware to the political party’s systems, established persistence, escalated privileges,
enumerated active directory accounts, and exfiltrated email from several accounts through
encrypted connections back through operational infrastructure.
In spring 2016, APT28 compromised the same political party, again via targeted spearphishing.
This time, the spearphishing email tricked recipients into changing their passwords through a
fake webmail domain hosted on APT28 operational infrastructure. Using the harvested
credentials, APT28 was able to gain access and steal content, likely leading to the exfiltration of
information from multiple senior party members. The U.S. Government assesses that information
was leaked to the press and publicly disclosed.
Figure 2: APT28’s Use of Spearphishing and Stolen Credentials
Actors likely associated with RIS are continuing to engage in spearphishing campaigns,
including one launched as recently as November 2016, just days after the U.S. election.
Reported Russian Military and Civilian Intelligence Services (RIS)
Alternate Names
APT28
APT29
Agent.btz
BlackEnergy V3
BlackEnergy2 APT
CakeDuke
Carberp
CHOPSTICK
CloudDuke
CORESHELL
CosmicDuke
COZYBEAR
COZYCAR
COZYDUKE
CrouchingYeti
DIONIS
Dragonfly
Energetic Bear
EVILTOSS
Fancy Bear
GeminiDuke
GREY CLOUD
HammerDuke
HAMMERTOSS
Havex
MiniDionis
MiniDuke
OLDBAIT
OnionDuke
Operation Pawn Storm
PinchDuke
Powershell backdoor
Quedagh
Sandworm
SEADADDY
Seaduke
SEDKIT
SEDNIT
Skipper
Sofacy
SOURFACE
SYNful Knock
Tiny Baron
Tsar Team
twain_64.dll (64-bit X-Agent implant)
VmUpgradeHelper.exe (X-Tunnel implant)
Waterbug
X-Agent
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Technical Details
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
IOCs associated with RIS cyber actors are provided within the accompanying .csv and .stix files
of JAR-16-20296.
Yara Signature
rule PAS_TOOL_PHP_WEB_KIT
{
meta:
description = “PAS TOOL PHP WEB KIT FOUND”
strings:
$php = “ 20KB and filesize < 22KB) and
#cookie == 2 and
#isset == 3 and
all of them
}
Actions to Take Using Indicators
DHS recommends that network administrators review the IP addresses, file hashes, and Yara
signature provided and add the IPs to their watchlist to determine whether malicious activity has
been observed within their organizations. The review of network perimeter netflow or firewall
logs will assist in determining whether your network has experienced suspicious activity.
When reviewing network perimeter logs for the IP addresses, organizations may find numerous
instances of these IPs attempting to connect to their systems. Upon reviewing the traffic from
these IPs, some traffic may correspond to malicious activity, and some may correspond to
legitimate activity. Some traffic that may appear legitimate is actually malicious, such as
vulnerability scanning or browsing of legitimate public facing services (e.g., HTTP, HTTPS,
FTP). Connections from these IPs may be performing vulnerability scans attempting to identify
websites that are vulnerable to cross-site scripting (XSS) or Structured Query Language (SQL)
injection attacks. If scanning identified vulnerable sites, attempts to exploit the vulnerabilities
may be experienced.
Network administrators are encouraged to check their public-facing websites for the malicious
file hashes. System owners are also advised to run the Yara signature on any system that is
suspected to have been targeted by RIS actors.
Threats from IOCs
Malicious actors may use a variety of methods to interfere with information systems. Some
methods of attack are listed below. Guidance provided is applicable to many other computer
networks.
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Injection Flaws are broad web application attack techniques that attempt to send
commands to a browser, database, or other system, allowing a regular user to control
behavior. The most common example is SQL injection, which subverts the relationship
between a webpage and its supporting database, typically to obtain information contained
inside the database. Another form is command injection, where an untrusted user is able
to send commands to operating systems supporting a web application or database. See the
United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) Publication on SQL
Injection for more information.
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities allow threat actors to insert and execute
unauthorized code in web applications. Successful XSS attacks on websites can provide
the attacker unauthorized access. For prevention and mitigation strategies against XSS,
see US-CERT’s Alert on Compromised Web Servers and Web Shells.
Server vulnerabilities may be exploited to allow unauthorized access to sensitive
information. An attack against a poorly configured server may allow an adversary access
to critical information including any websites or databases hosted on the server. See USCERT’s Tip on Website Security for additional information.
Recommended Mitigations
Commit to Cybersecurity Best Practices
A commitment to good cybersecurity and best practices is critical to protecting networks and
systems. Here are some questions you may want to ask your organization to help prevent and
mitigate against attacks.
1. Backups: Do we backup all critical information? Are the backups stored offline? Have
we tested our ability to revert to backups during an incident?
2. Risk Analysis: Have we conducted a cybersecurity risk analysis of the organization?
3. Staff Training: Have we trained staff on cybersecurity best practices?
4. Vulnerability Scanning & Patching: Have we implemented regular scans of our
network and systems and appropriate patching of known system vulnerabilities?
5. Application Whitelisting: Do we allow only approved programs to run on our networks?
6. Incident Response: Do we have an incident response plan and have we practiced it?
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7. Business Continuity: Are we able to sustain business operations without access to
certain systems? For how long? Have we tested this?
8. Penetration Testing: Have we attempted to hack into our own systems to test the
security of our systems and our ability to defend against attacks?
Top Seven Mitigation Strategies
DHS encourages network administrators to implement the recommendations below, which can
prevent as many as 85 percent of targeted cyber-attacks. These strategies are common sense to
many, but DHS continues to see intrusions because organizations fail to use these basic
measures.
1. Patch applications and operating systems – Vulnerable applications and operating
systems are the targets of most attacks. Ensuring these are patched with the latest updates
greatly reduces the number of exploitable entry points available to an attacker. Use best
practices when updating software and patches by only downloading updates from
authenticated vendor sites.
2. Application whitelisting – Whitelisting is one of the best security strategies because it
allows only specified programs to run while blocking all others, including malicious
software.
3. Restrict administrative privileges – Threat actors are increasingly focused on gaining
control of legitimate credentials, especially those associated with highly privileged
accounts. Reduce privileges to only those needed for a user’s duties. Separate
administrators into privilege tiers with limited access to other tiers.
4. Network Segmentation and Segregation into Security Zones – Segment networks into
logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communications paths. This helps protect
sensitive information and critical services and limits damage from network perimeter
breaches.
5. Input validation – Input validation is a method of sanitizing untrusted user input
provided by users of a web application, and may prevent many types of web application
security flaws, such as SQLi, XSS, and command injection.
6. File Reputation – Tune Anti-Virus file reputation systems to the most aggressive setting
possible; some products can limit execution to only the highest reputation files, stopping
a wide range of untrustworthy code from gaining control.
7. Understanding firewalls – When anyone or anything can access your network at any
time, your network is more susceptible to being attacked. Firewalls can be configured to
block data from certain locations (IP whitelisting) or applications while allowing relevant
and necessary data through.
Responding to Unauthorized Access to Networks
Implement your security incident response and business continuity plan. It may take time
for your organization’s IT professionals to isolate and remove threats to your systems and restore
normal operations. Meanwhile, you should take steps to maintain your organization’s essential
functions according to your business continuity plan. Organizations should maintain and
regularly test backup plans, disaster recovery plans, and business continuity procedures.
Contact DHS or law enforcement immediately. We encourage you to contact DHS NCCIC
([email protected] or 888-282-0870), the FBI through a local field office or
the FBI’s Cyber Division ([email protected] or 855-292-3937) to report an intrusion and to
request incident response resources or technical assistance.
Detailed Mitigation Strategies
Protect Against SQL Injection and Other Attacks on Web Services
Routinely evaluate known and published vulnerabilities, perform software updates and
technology refreshes periodically, and audit external-facing systems for known Web application
vulnerabilities. Take steps to harden both Web applications and the servers hosting them to
reduce the risk of network intrusion via this vector. 1
Phishing and Spearphishing
• Implement a Sender Policy Framework (SPF) record for your organization’s Domain
Name System (DNS) zone file to minimize risks relating to the receipt of spoofed
messages.
• Educate users to be suspicious of unsolicited phone calls, social media interactions, or
email messages from individuals asking about employees or other internal information. If
an unknown individual claims to be from a legitimate organization, try to verify his or her
identity directly with the company.
• Do not provide personal information or information about your organization, including its
structure or networks, unless you are certain of a person’s authority to have the
information.
• Do not reveal personal or financial information in social media or email, and do not
respond to solicitations for this information. This includes following links sent in email.
• Pay attention to the URL of a website. Malicious websites may look identical to a
legitimate site, but the URL often includes a variation in spelling or a different domain
than the valid website (e.g., .com vs. .net).
• If you are unsure whether an email request is legitimate, try to verify it by contacting the
company directly. Do not use contact information provided on a website connected to the
request; instead, check previous statements for contact information. Information about
known phishing attacks is also available online from groups such as the Anti-Phishing
Working Group (http://www.antiphishing.org).
• Take advantage of anti-phishing features offered by your email client and web browser.
• Patch all systems for critical vulnerabilities, prioritizing timely patching of software that
processes Internet data, such as web browsers, browser plugins, and document readers.
Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls
• Reduce privileges to only those needed for a user’s duties.
• Restrict users’ ability (permissions) to install and run unwanted software applications,
and apply the principle of “Least Privilege” to all systems and services. Restricting these
privileges may prevent malware from running or limit its capability to spread through the
network.
• Carefully consider the risks before granting administrative rights to users on their own
machines.
• Scrub and verify all administrator accounts regularly.
• Configure Group Policy to restrict all users to only one login session, where possible.
• Enforce secure network authentication where possible.
• Instruct administrators to use non-privileged accounts for standard functions such as Web
browsing or checking Web mail.
Segment networks into logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communication paths.
Containment provided by enclaving also makes incident cleanup significantly less costly.
Configure firewalls to disallow RDP traffic coming from outside of the network
boundary, except for in specific configurations such as when tunneled through a
secondary VPN with lower privileges.
Audit existing firewall rules and close all ports that are not explicitly needed for business.
Specifically, carefully consider which ports should be connecting outbound versus
inbound.
Enforce a strict lockout policy for network users and closely monitor logs for failed login
activity. This can be indicative of failed intrusion activity.
If remote access between zones is an unavoidable business need, log and monitor these
connections closely.
In environments with a high risk of interception or intrusion, organizations should
consider supplementing password authentication with other forms of authentication such
as challenge/response or multifactor authentication using biometric or physical tokens.
Credentials
• Enforce a tiered administrative model with dedicated administrator workstations and
separate administrative accounts that are used exclusively for each tier to prevent tools,
such as Mimikatz, for credential theft from harvesting domain-level credentials.
• Implement multi-factor authentication (e.g., smart cards) or at minimum ensure users
choose complex passwords that change regularly.
• Be aware that some services (e.g., FTP, telnet, and .rlogin) transmit user credentials in
clear text. Minimize the use of these services where possible or consider more secure
alternatives.
• Properly secure password files by making hashed passwords more difficult to acquire.
Password hashes can be cracked within seconds using freely available tools. Consider
restricting access to sensitive password hashes by using a shadow password file or
equivalent on UNIX systems.
• Replace or modify services so that all user credentials are passed through an encrypted
channel.
• Avoid password policies that reduce the overall strength of credentials. Policies to avoid
include lack of password expiration date, lack of lockout policy, low or disabled
password complexity requirements, and password history set to zero.
• Ensure that users are not re-using passwords between zones by setting policies and
conducting regular audits.
• Use unique passwords for local accounts for each device.
Logging Practices
• Ensure event logging (applications, events, login activities, security attributes, etc.) is
turned on or monitored for identification of security issues.
• Configure network logs to provide enough information to assist in quickly developing an
accurate determination of a security incident.
• Upgrade PowerShell to new versions with enhanced logging features and monitor the
logs to detect usage of PowerShell commands, which are often malware-related.
• Secure logs, potentially in a centralized location, and protect them from modification.
• Prepare an incident response plan that can be rapidly implemented in case of a cyber
intrusion.
How to Enhance Your Organization’s Cybersecurity Posture
DHS offers a variety of resources for organizations to help recognize and address their
cybersecurity risks. Resources include discussion points, steps to start evaluating a cybersecurity
program, and a list of hands-on resources available to organizations. For a list of services, visit
https://www.us-cert.gov/ccubedvp. Other resources include:
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The Cyber Security Advisors (CSA) program bolsters cybersecurity preparedness, risk
mitigation, and incident response capabilities of critical infrastructure entities and more
closely aligns them with the Federal Government. CSAs are DHS personnel assigned to
districts throughout the country and territories, with at least one advisor in each of the 10
CSA regions, which mirror the Federal Emergency Management Agency regions. For
more information, email [email protected].
Cyber Resilience Review (CRR) is a no-cost, voluntary assessment to evaluate and
enhance cybersecurity within critical infrastructure sectors, as well as state, local, tribal,
and territorial governments. The goal of the CRR is to develop an understanding and
measurement of key cybersecurity capabilities to provide meaningful indicators of an
entity’s operational resilience and ability to manage cyber risk to critical services during
normal operations and times of operational stress and crisis. Visit
https://www.cert.org/resilience/rmm.html to learn more about the CERT Resilience
Management Model.
Enhanced Cybersecurity Services (ECS) helps critical infrastructure owners and
operators protect their systems by sharing sensitive and classified cyber threat
information with Commercial Service Providers (CSPs) and Operational Implementers
(OIs). CSPs then use the cyber threat information to protect CI customers. OIs use the
threat information to protect internal networks. For more information, email
[email protected].
The Cybersecurity Information Sharing and Collaboration Program (CISCP) is a
voluntary information-sharing and collaboration program between and among critical
infrastructure partners and the Federal Government. For more information, email
[email protected].
The Automated Indicator Sharing (AIS) initiative is a DHS effort to create a system
where as soon as a company or federal agency observes an attempted compromise, the
indicator will be shared in real time with all of our partners, protecting them from that
particular threat. That means adversaries can only use an attack once, which increases
their costs and ultimately reduces the prevalence of cyber-attacks. While AIS will not
eliminate sophisticated cyber threats, it will allow companies and federal agencies to
concentrate more on them by clearing away less sophisticated attacks.
AIS participants connect to a DHS-managed system in the NCCIC that allows
bidirectional sharing of cyber threat indicators. A server housed at each participant’s
location allows each to exchange indicators with the NCCIC. Participants will not only
receive DHS-developed indicators, but can share indicators they have observed in their
own network defense efforts, which DHS will then share with all AIS participants. For
more information, visit https://www.dhs.gov/ais.
The Cybersecurity Framework (Framework), developed by the National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST) in collaboration with the public and private sectors, is
a tool that can improve the cybersecurity readiness of entities. The Framework enables
entities, regardless of size, degree of cyber risk, or cyber sophistication, to apply
principles and best practices of risk management to improve the security and resiliency of
critical infrastructure. The Framework provides standards, guidelines, and practices that
are working effectively today. It consists of three parts—the Framework Core, the
Framework Profile, and Framework Implementation Tiers—and emphasizes five
functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, and Recover. Use of the Framework is
strictly voluntary. For more information, visit https://www.nist.gov/cyberframework or
email [email protected].