In March 2021 the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) observed Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actors scanning devices on ports 4443, 8443, and 10443 for CVE-2018-13379, and enumerated devices for CVE-2020-12812 and CVE-2019-5591. It is likely that the APT actors are scanning for these vulnerabilities to gain access to multiple government, commercial, and technology services networks. APT actors have historically exploited critical vulnerabilities to conduct distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, ransomware attacks, structured query language (SQL) injection attacks, spearphishing campaigns, website defacements, and disinformation campaigns.

The FBI and CISA have information indicating APT actors are using multiple CVEs to exploit Fortinet FortiOS vulnerabilities. The FBI and CISA believe the APT actors are likely exploiting these Fortinet FortiOS vulnerabilities—CVE 2018-13379, CVE-2020-12812, and CVE-2019-5591—to gain access to multiple government, commercial, and technology services networks.

The APT actors may be using any or all of these CVEs to gain access to networks across multiple critical infrastructure sectors to gain access to key networks as pre-positioning for follow-on data exfiltration or data encryption attacks. APT actors may use other CVEs or common exploitation techniques—such as spearphishing—to gain access to critical infrastructure networks to pre-position for follow-on attacks.

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While Malwarebytes observed a relative plateau in the overall volume of threat detections in 2019, our telemetry showed a clear trend toward industrialization. Global Windows malware detections on business endpoints increased by 13 percent, and a bifurcation of attack techniques split threat categories neatly between those targeting consumers and those affecting organizations’ networks. The Trojan-turned-botnets Emotet and TrickBot made a return in 2019 to terrorize organizations alongside new ransomware families, such as Ryuk, Sodinokibi, and Phobos.

In addition, a flood of hack tools and registry key disablers made a splashy debut in our top detections, a reflection of the greater sophistication used by today’s business-focused attackers.

Meanwhile, the 2019 mobile threat landscape fared no better. While Malwarebytes launched a massive drive to combat stalkerware—apps that enable users to monitor their partners’ every digital move—which led to an increase in our detections, other nefarious threats lingered on the horizon, with increases in their detections not being helped along by our own research efforts. We observed a rise in pre-installed malware and adware on the devices of our Android customers, with the goal to either steal data or steal attention.

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