Pierluigi Paganini October 26, 2019

A new MageCart attack made the headlines, this time hackers planted a software skimmer in the Procter & Gamble’s site First Aid Beauty website.

According to Willem de Groot, a researcher at Sanguine Security, threat actors planted a MageCart software skimmer on Procter & Gamble’s site First Aid Beauty on May 5, and the malicious code has remained undetected since today.

First Aid Beauty was acquired by Procter & Gamble marks in 2018 for $250 million.

The malicious code found in the First Aid Beauty website was developed to only select victims from the US using Windows systems.

de Groot reported his findings to the company last week, but unfortunately, he received no response. Initially the website was no longer accessible, showing a 503 Service Unavailable error, then after the publishing of the news online, the e-skimmer was removed.

According to Alexa, the First Aid Beauty web site has around %93 of visitors being from the U.S., for this reason, attackers developed MageCart scrip that is able to only target them. Unfortunately the malicious script remained undetected for more than five months.

“de Groot told us that website owners typically discover these skimmers withing a couple of weeks but this one resisted for more than five months, “so the level of stealth for this actor is outstanding.” reads the post published by BleepingComputer.

de Groot pointed out that the software skimmer was heavily obfuscated and uses encryption, these features suggest that the attack was carried out by crooks familiar with e-skimming attacks.

de Groot also provided a deobfuscated version of the script that was developed to steal payment card data, including card number, expiration date, the name of the owner, and the CVV code.

This week, the US FBI issued a warning for the US private sector about e-skimming attacks carried out by the Magecart cybercrime groups.

As part of the Cyber Security Month, the FBI is urging organizations, especially small and medium-sized businesses and government agencies, to adopt the necessary countermeasures to prevent e-skimming attacks.

Below the list of recommendations provided by the FBI:

• Update and patch all systems with the latest security software. Anti-virus and anti-malware need to be up-to-date and firewalls strong.
• Change default login credentials on all systems.
• Educate employees about safe cyber practices. Most importantly, do not click on links or unexpected attachments in messages.
• Segregate and segment network systems to limit how easily cyber criminals can move from one to another.

Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – First Aid Beauty, Magecart)

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