ADVSTORESHELL
ADVSTORESHELL is a spying backdoor that has been used by APT28 from at least 2012 to 2016. It is generally used for long-term espionage and is deployed on targets deemed interesting after a reconnaissance phase. [1] [2]
Techniques Used
| Domain | ID | Name | Use | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Enterprise | T1071 | .001 | Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols |
ADVSTORESHELL connects to port 80 of a C2 server using Wininet API. Data is exchanged via HTTP POSTs.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1560 | Archive Collected Data |
ADVSTORESHELL encrypts with the 3DES algorithm and a hardcoded key prior to exfiltration.[2] |
|
| .003 | Archive via Custom Method |
ADVSTORESHELL compresses output data generated by command execution with a custom implementation of the Lempel–Ziv–Welch (LZW) algorithm.[2] |
||
| Enterprise | T1547 | .001 | Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder |
ADVSTORESHELL achieves persistence by adding itself to the |
| Enterprise | T1059 | .003 | Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell |
ADVSTORESHELL can create a remote shell and run a given command.[2][3] |
| Enterprise | T1132 | .001 | Data Encoding: Standard Encoding |
C2 traffic from ADVSTORESHELL is encrypted, then encoded with Base64 encoding.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1074 | .001 | Data Staged: Local Data Staging |
ADVSTORESHELL stores output from command execution in a .dat file in the %TEMP% directory.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1573 | .001 | Encrypted Channel: Symmetric Cryptography |
A variant of ADVSTORESHELL encrypts some C2 with 3DES.[3] |
| .002 | Encrypted Channel: Asymmetric Cryptography |
A variant of ADVSTORESHELL encrypts some C2 with RSA.[3] |
||
| Enterprise | T1546 | .015 | Event Triggered Execution: Component Object Model Hijacking |
Some variants of ADVSTORESHELL achieve persistence by registering the payload as a Shell Icon Overlay handler COM object.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1041 | Exfiltration Over C2 Channel |
ADVSTORESHELL exfiltrates data over the same channel used for C2.[2] |
|
| Enterprise | T1083 | File and Directory Discovery |
ADVSTORESHELL can list files and directories.[2][3] |
|
| Enterprise | T1070 | .004 | Indicator Removal: File Deletion |
ADVSTORESHELL can delete files and directories.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1056 | .001 | Input Capture: Keylogging |
ADVSTORESHELL can perform keylogging.[2][3] |
| Enterprise | T1112 | Modify Registry |
ADVSTORESHELL is capable of setting and deleting Registry values.[3] |
|
| Enterprise | T1106 | Native API |
ADVSTORESHELL is capable of starting a process using CreateProcess.[3] |
|
| Enterprise | T1027 | Obfuscated Files or Information |
Most of the strings in ADVSTORESHELL are encrypted with an XOR-based algorithm; some strings are also encrypted with 3DES and reversed. API function names are also reversed, presumably to avoid detection in memory.[1][3] |
|
| Enterprise | T1120 | Peripheral Device Discovery |
ADVSTORESHELL can list connected devices.[2] |
|
| Enterprise | T1057 | Process Discovery |
ADVSTORESHELL can list running processes.[2] |
|
| Enterprise | T1012 | Query Registry |
ADVSTORESHELL can enumerate registry keys.[2][3] |
|
| Enterprise | T1029 | Scheduled Transfer |
ADVSTORESHELL collects, compresses, encrypts, and exfiltrates data to the C2 server every 10 minutes.[2] |
|
| Enterprise | T1218 | .011 | System Binary Proxy Execution: Rundll32 |
ADVSTORESHELL has used rundll32.exe in a Registry value to establish persistence.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1082 | System Information Discovery |
ADVSTORESHELL can run Systeminfo to gather information about the victim.[2][3] |
|