Who Are Those Bots?
I’m operating a mail server for multiple domains. This server is regularly targeted by bots that launch brute-force attacks to try to steal credentials. They try a list of common usernames but they also try targeted ones based on a list of email addresses that have been crawled. The mail server is protected by several security controls. One of them is an automatic blocking of offending IP addresses to slow down such kinds of attacks (brute-force) but I noticed that this technique was less and less relevant. Indeed, when a new wave of connections is launched, they are coming from a lot of different IP addresses that just test a few credentials and, therefore, do not trigger the automatic blocking. I extracted the list of IP addresses that generated authentication failures for the last 30 days and got a list of 11K addresses. They are part of botnets used to launch these attacks. But who are those bots? What kind of host are we facing?
I performed a scan of the 11K IP addresses and tried to extract some useful information about them.
First, there are spread all over the world:
Top-20 of source countries:
Numbers Country 1964 Brazil 1439 United States 839 India 596 Argentina 457 South Korea 308 South Africa 275 Poland 245 Russia 234 Iran 230 Spain 223 Taiwan 223 Vietnam 183 United Kingdom 148 Canada 136 France 113 Hong Kong 104 Thailand 96 Italy 90 Germany 80 Israel
Most of the IP addresses were not reachable or protected by any kind of packet filtering, however, I collected interesting info. Here are some of them.
Interesting domains found by resolving PTR records for all IPs:
agri.gov effi.org gouv.fr gov.la gov.np mit.edu rit.edu
Many devices are from the same brand and have an SSH service exposed. They share the same SSH keys:
43:a1:56:fb:8a:8b:31:95:9f:c1:d1:81:f1:88:1d:99 e6:69:15:e5:87:a1:1b:54:41:d2:77:03:88:e7:1e:11 f3:b8:a8:76:2f:f7:6c:55:7e:f6:7b:cb:4e:07:0e:d9 79:22:d3:cc:e9:f7:32:79:0e:0c:7a:30:86:43:aa:3b a9:89:a5:d1:4c:52:a7:d7:ab:1d:ec:6b:f9:b8:2c:9f d0:01:0b:2b:e8:4b:72:b8:ef:a2:9b:23:ed:60:47:7b eb:46:ab:9a:11:7f:10:5c:9a:f0:1c:5b:9e:39:cf:ec ef:d7:16:bf:cd:62:ba:0a:5f:56:b6:e4:ac:4d:8d:6e f5:84:ab:48:3c:ba:7c:22:71:b3:c3:95:9b:da:9c:e3 54:9f:e6:91:af:41:a0:80:80:90:ab:95:1a:b3:83:b2 35:47:3c:e0:44:14:fb:39:ec:95:a4:a8:9a:28:29:ce 4e:22:4a:03:ca:10:99:5c:3e:8d:c8:4f:3a:05:db:7e 57:8c:9c:09:91:9a:54:8d:6a:88:88:98:5c:3c:87:e0 d3:46:7f:23:58:63:62:e4:35:c5:5e:99:ca:c9:6a:3a a2:88:9a:23:d0:bf:f0:f9:3e:af:77:6d:02:86:7b:3a f6:13:34:6f:3e:99:34:ed:f9:8c:27:10:a1:1d:e6:d1 a8:6a:24:5d:e6:f2:8e:00:e3:cc:2b:ec:76:7c:bc:e8 9d:c9:02:25:d6:73:b2:6f:54:b4:16:7f:eb:0f:1d:20 45:a9:db:56:75:df:c2:e6:b7:f2:14:41:a4:fe:85:e0 00:34:07:d9:c1:f5:01:f0:e9:b3:3d:e3:be:1d:f3:28 b6:5d:f7:0d:5e:f6:9b:de:60:0e:43:cf:bc:4b:20:4a 30:b6:29:06:27:62:bb:cd:a1:aa:65:84:08:62:31:ab 16:f8:8c:fe:cf:9b:51:92:1a:9e:39:d5:db:f6:17:d4 84:c8:13:c4:be:a5:04:af:39:1f:42:ea:0c:32:70:39 21:45:57:55:75:41:b3:cc:fc:61:df:18:61:8f:9e:a0 0e:ec:f4:f9:29:78:1d:9d:9c:45:86:6c:9c:a6:69:cf 88:24:9b:f6:7f:bb:63:40:06:fd:60:ea:7c:7f:32:c6 25:14:1f:ec:80:8a:79:94:b3:bb:af:96:8e:d3:78:78 e9:33:e6:7e:f9:c3:55:2b:3f:0f:ab:ab:75:7d:e2:f6 6b:16:a7:87:4a:18:06:33:82:14:95:33:ab:67:b5:06 3b:9d:e5:a9:28:4a:e2:fd:6e:f8:02:17:e8:03:94:39 f0:46:ee:7e:36:e8:18:c9:3c:1f:6a:dd:92:16:67:a1 87:71:51:36:a9:5f:cb:7f:08:15:30:58:cb:0c:68:4f 4a:42:82:80:56:e0:74:38:b5:6d:17:9b:a8:87:1c:fb 02:59:bd:a0:50:8d:b4:1e:79:2f:21:d4:01:b2:40:d8 06:4a:19:93:08:86:06:8c:91:c3:39:ae:3b:98:b6:db a9:7b:bd:93:a0:22:a7:f5:d4:a8:22:d0:7f:48:ae:ce 52:59:2c:10:4a:7e:8f:b8:e8:29:4c:b1:53:ca:38:ea c0:9a:94:4f:9e:ad:07:4d:62:a7:6c:f6:db:a3:5f:80 af:53:90:6c:00:8b:7a:34:4a:2f:54:a0:7d:63:37:15 29:9e:ae:af:0e:6f:61:60:45:49:ad:00:00:2b:f6:b9 73:3a:03:c7:8e:31:42:8f:df:04:1a:d2:94:c0:d9:0a 12:14:fc:bc:b0:13:10:a3:45:ee:39:13:c5:75:2a:01 47:25:71:67:e2:95:4a:13:b2:df:3d:97:7b:55:ae:08 fc:a2:df:a7:61:ac:74:13:94:4c:dd:0c:78:02:d5:ad fd:92:53:03:b7:76:30:20:6b:c8:b5:19:70:1a:4f:62 b8:af:88:4c:da:6f:98:a9:b8:49:7c:29:d4:9a:72:52 b2:b8:7f:2c:89:bd:98:60:b6:71:4e:58:73:a0:fa:93 44:30:15:f7:a8:27:73:6a:3f:e7:ca:12:b7:c3:1d:6d 17:60:bb:44:2f:36:d8:df:6b:98:fb:63:7f:52:a7:a1 2c:8f:45:59:7b:17:3c:c1:c6:b8:c4:24:00:b3:fe:b4 e0:08:48:a0:e1:ea:91:a0:7a:a2:de:b9:d7:14:7a:06 a6:03:ad:51:a4:84:4a:f2:32:fb:77:46:c7:25:0f:eb f0:22:60:cc:5c:65:97:eb:c6:24:02:7c:24:9b:42:50 4a:b0:16:7c:c5:46:ea:75:1e:24:8d:70:e5:99:47:bc 65:6e:fb:a7:48:e5:c5:fe:b0:46:1d:e6:09:6f:55:0a
Now, let's have a look at the models of devices that are scanning. To achieve this, I had a look at the CPE ("Common Platform Enumeration"). I removed most of the data and kept vendors. Note that it can be wrong if the bot is running behind a NAT'd network.
Numbers Vendor 1110 linux 63 google 46 ubnt 38 freebsd 37 hp 24 linksys 24 dlink 23 asus 22 juniper 21 synology 20 crestron 16 netgear 16 microsoft 15 axis 13 geovision 13 cisco 12 windriver 12 dell 11 apple 11 3com 10 mikrotik 10 kemp 10 infomir 8 grandstream 8 alliedtelesyn 7 directv 7 cyanogenmod 6 canon 5 tenda 5 oracle 5 openbsd 5 micronet 5 lexmark 5 iomega 5 epson 5 aerohive 4 watchguard 4 symantec 4 smc 4 ibm 4 extremenetworks 4 avm 3 xerox 3 vodavi 3 sun 3 siemens 3 ruckus 3 rockwellautomation 3 pirelli 3 oneaccess 3 ironport 3 huawei 3 gemtek 3 arubanetworks 2 tranzeo 2 toshiba 2 tandberg 2 supermicro 2 sonyericsson 2 lacie 2 ipxe 2 iptime 2 io-data 2 hikvision 2 fujitsu 2 brocade 2 arris 2 adtran 1 zyxel 1 zonealarm 1 vodafone 1 utstarcom 1 tp-link 1 thomson 1 sphairon 1 sony 1 sonos 1 sonicwall 1 shoretel 1 scientific_atlanta 1 riverbed 1 raritan 1 qtech 1 qnap 1 philips 1 pheenet 1 olivetti 1 netgem 1 netasq 1 motorola 1 kyocera 1 ipfire 1 igel 1 fortinet 1 enterasys 1 ecoscentric 1 drobo 1 dish 1 comtrend 1 citrix 1 checkpoint 1 belkin 1 airmagnet
The most interesting one for me: "rockwellautomation", related to industrial devices!
What about the "open" TCP ports? (Note: I did not scan UDP ports to reduce the scan time)
On average, one bot has 18.8 TCP ports publicly facing the Internet. The worst one had 74 ports exposed!
Here are the top-10 ports:
Numbers Port 574 22 408 80 180 8080 104 443 94 2000 84 8000 82 53 77 23 68 10001 51 2222 51 1723 46 8022 45 81 44 554 39 8291 27 8081 26 4444 25 8888 24 161 18 85
Xavier Mertens (@xme)
Xameco
Senior ISC Handler - Freelance Cyber Security Consultant
PGP Key
Reverse-Engineering Malware: Advanced Code Analysis | Singapore | Nov 18th - Nov 22nd 2024 |
Comments
For me, it was simply further justification for A) keeping our email servers INSIDE our corporate networks (requiring a VPN connection with multi-factor auth to access) and B) setting up a log analysis module that would watch for IPs trying brute-force attacks and updating an internal RBL (why accept email from an IP that's trying to break in), update DNS RPZ zone (why allow hostnames that resolve to an IP trying to attack us), and update a log-analysis engine (I want to know about anyone suddenly sending non-attack-related traffic to/from an IP that's been attacking us). :-)
When the internet is giving you lemons, make lemonade!
PS. I found that auto-updating the RPZ filters DID pay off too. On more than one occasion I found malicious URLs in spam/phish pointing to an IP that had been previously seen doing brute-force attacks on our email gateways. Interesting, no? It confirmed (for me anyway) that the IPs in these botnets are not ONLY used for port-scans and brute-force attacks, but hosting malware, landing pages, phishing pages, etc as well.
PPS. I dunno what I'm doing wrong, but my reply is flagged as "anonymous" again even tho I was logged in when I sent it. Weird.
Anonymous
Feb 15th 2022
2 years ago
I have actually seen the same thing. This is still happening a lot.
Some information additional information others can use.
When attacking over TCP port 465 - The following JA3 is observed.
JA3: f17ca639ecdcaa65b4521c49e3515ef9
Pcap file with an attack.
https://networkforensic.dk/images/2021/BotNet/IOT-Attack.zip
SHA1: 0c8b31996bba6c5668292ad111fbedf55199040f
Some attacking IP's:
https://networkforensic.dk/images/2021/BotNet/RAW-IP-LIST-IOT-BOTNET.zip
SHA1: 95325e453bf44d15e97523b7f749a66ec608e185
SNORT IDS SIGS
alert tcp $EXTERNAL_NET any -> $HOME_NET [465,993] (msg:"NF - IOT BotNet Attacking - Password Attacks"; flow:to_server,established; ssl_state:client_hello; content:"|00 33 00 32 00 31 00 30 00|"; reference:url,networkforensic.dk; reference:url,www.guardicore.com/labs/fritzfrog-a-new-generation-of-peer-to-peer-botnets; metadata:06122021; classtype:attempted-user; sid:5027901; rev:3;)
alert tcp $EXTERNAL_NET any -> $HOME_NET [465,993] (msg:"NF - IOT BotNet Attacking - Password Attacks"; flow:to_server,established; ssl_state:client_hello; content:"|35 00 2f 00 39 00 33 00 3d 00 3c 00 6b 00 67 00 6a|"; reference:url,networkforensic.dk; reference:url,www.guardicore.com/labs/fritzfrog-a-new-generation-of-peer-to-peer-botnets; metadata:21122021; classtype:attempted-user; sid:5027902; rev:1;)
Written in danish (Sorry)
You can see more i believe is related to what have been seen here.
19 Januar 2022 - Blog Post # 812
16 December 2021 - Blog Post # 806
10 December 2021 - Blog Post # 805
Happy hunting
Anonymous
Feb 16th 2022
2 years ago
Anonymous
Feb 18th 2022
2 years ago