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Vulnerabilities/Threats
3 MIN READ
News
EXPLOIT FOR CRITICAL WINDOWS DEFENDER BYPASS GOES PUBLIC
Threat actors were actively exploiting CVE-2023-36025 in Windows SmartScreen as
a zero-day vulnerability before Microsoft patched it in November.
Jai Vijayan
Contributing Writer, Dark Reading
November 21, 2023
Source: tomfallen via Shutterstock
PDF
A proof-of-concept exploit (PoC) has become available for a critical zero-day
vulnerability in the Windows SmartScreen technology.
Microsoft issued a patch for the issue in its November Patch Tuesday security
update, but the bug was already under active exploit at the time as a zero-day.
Now, the PoC further heightens the need for organizations to address the bug, if
they haven't done so already.
SECURITY BYPASS FOR GETTING PAST DEFENDER
CVE-2023-36025 is a security bypass flaw that gives attackers a way to sneak
malicious code past Windows Defender SmartScreen checks without triggering any
alerts. To exploit the flaw, an attacker would need to get a user to click on a
maliciously crafted Internet shortcut (.URL) or a link pointing to such a file.
Microsoft has identified the bug as involving low attack complexity, requiring
only low privileges and exploitable over the Internet. The vulnerability is
present in Windows 10, Windows 11, and in Windows Server 2008 and later
releases. Several security researchers earlier this month had described
CVE-2023-36025 as being among the higher priority bugs to fix from Microsoft's
November update.
The recent release of a PoC Internet shortcut file that an attacker could use to
exploit CVE-2023-36025 is sure to heighten concerns around the vulnerability.
The script basically shows how an attacker could generate a seemingly legitimate
looking but malicious .URL file and distribute it via a phishing email. "This
.URL file points to a malicious website but could be presented as something
legitimate," the researcher who wrote the attack script noted. "An attacker
could deliver this crafted .URL file via phishing emails or through compromised
websites."
A user tricked into clicking on the file would land directly on the malicious
site or execute malicious code without receiving any of the usual warnings from
SmartScreen.
"The exploitation of CVE-2023-36025 can lead to successful phishing attacks,
malware distribution, and other cybersecurity threats," the researcher said.
APT GROUP TA544 AMONG THOSE ABUSING FLAW
Among those targeting CVE-2023-36025 is TA544, a financially motivated, advanced
persistent threat (APT) actor that Proofpoint and others have been tracking
since at least 2017. Over the years, the threat group has used a variety of
malware tools in campaigns targeting organizations in western Europe and Japan.
But it is best known for distributing the Ursnif (aka Gozi) banking Trojan, and
more recently a sophisticated second-stage downloader dubbed WikiLoader.
This week, a researcher at Proofpoint reported observing TA544 abusing
CVE-2023-36025 in a campaign involving Remcos, a remote access Trojan that
various threat actors have used over the years to remotely control and monitor
compromised Windows devices. For the present campaign, the threat actor has
established a unique webpage with links that direct users to a .URL file
containing a path to a virtual hard disk (.vhd) file or to a .zip file hosted on
a compromised website. CVE-2023-36025 gives the attackers a way to automatically
mount the VHD on systems just by opening the .URL file, the researcher said.
"SmartScreen is used by Windows to prevent phishing attacks or access to
malicious websites and the download of untrusted or potentially malicious
files," Kev Breen, senior director of threat research at Immersive Labs, had
noted when Microsoft first disclosed the SmartScreen vulnerability earlier this
month. "This vulnerability suggests that a specially crafted file could be used
by attackers to bypass this check, reducing the overall security of the
operating system."
CVE-2023-36025 is the third zero-day bug in SmartScreen that Microsoft has
disclosed so far this year. In February, researchers at Google found a threat
actor abusing a previously unknown SmartScreen vulnerability to drop Magniber
ransomware on target systems. Microsoft assigned the vulnerability as
CVE-2023-24880 and issued a patch for it in March.
In July, the company patched CVE-2023-32049, a security bypass vulnerability in
SmartScreen that threat actors were already actively exploiting at the time of
patching.
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