Pierluigi Paganini
July 03, 2013
F-Secure has recently announced the discovery of an Android Hack-Tool that is able to steal data from victims. The revelation confirms the concerns of principal security experts that are assisting to the explosion for Android botnets and in general of mobile cyber threats specifically targeting mobile Google OS.
The recently discovered Android malware, dubbed USB Cleaver, is able to compromise the victim’s mobile and also infects his PC stealing sensitive information from it.
F-Secure analysts discovered the malicious application monitoring a Chinese language forum about an Android app, in particular the discussions on the possibility to turn a mobile device into an Android Hack-Tool capable of stealing information from a connected machine.
“He managed to find a sample (MD5:283d16309a5a35a13f8fa4c5e1ae01b1) for further investigation. When executed, the sample (detected as Hack-Tool:Android/UsbCleaver.A) installs an app named USBCleaver on the device:”
The hacking tool USBCleaver discovered by analysts at F-Secure is capable to steal data directly from Windows machine connected to the infected mobile, this category of tool is a privileged instrument to conduct targeted attacks.
Using an Android Hack-Tool such as USB Cleaver an attacker could gather sensitive information from the victims, data that could be used for further offensive such as spear-phishing campaign or watering hole attacks.
The Android Hack-Tool is able to steak users’ passwords from principal browsers such as Chrome, IE and Firefox including PC’s Wi-Fi password and other network information supporting reconnaissance phase in a cyber attack.
The operation of the Android Hack-Tool is quite simple, the hacker need to install the USB Cleaver on the victim’s Android device. Once executed, USB Cleaver downloads a ZIP file from a remote server and then unzips it to the following location:
/mnt/sdcard/usbcleaver/system
Plugging the infected device into a PC, /mnt/sdcard is mounted and, if autorun is enabled, go.bat and the payload are executed.
The attacker just needs to select what type of information should be gathered.
The utilities save their results in /mnt/sattackedcard/usbcleaver/logs which the app user can view later by clicking “Log files”.
According the Q1 2013 Mobile Threat Report released by F-Secure malware threat targeting Android devices is rapidly growing in complexity and sophistication. The study reveals that Android accounts in Q1 of 136 out of 149 known threats, about 91% of overall malware activity registering an increment respect 2012 to 79%.
The research reveals that mobile threats are mainly motivated by profits, 76.5 % of malicious code are designed with specific intent to monetize the victim’s infected.
The report confirmed a concerning trend, differently for previously discovered malware such as Sscul focused on remote eavesdropping, USBCleaver seems to be designed with specific intent to facilitate a targeted attack by gathering details that would be helpful in a later attack.
Regarding the specific menace it is necessary to specify that USBCleaver can be neutralized disabling the Autorun by default, option considered as standard starting from Windows 7 . As specified by F-Secure post “An additional mitigating factor is that most older Windows systems need to have mobile drivers manually installed in order for this attack to work.”
Get ready for the advent of new agents and malicious Android Hack-Tool, the cybercrime and state-sponsored hackers are very interested to exploit of the popular OS.
Pierluigi Paganini
(Security Affairs – Android Hack-Tool)
