Connect with us

Hi, what are you looking for?

SecurityWeekSecurityWeek

Malware & Threats

Tsukuba Banking Trojan Targets Users in Japan

Researchers at IBM Trusteer have come across a new banking Trojan that is designed to target the customers of Japanese financial institutions.

Researchers at IBM Trusteer have come across a new banking Trojan that is designed to target the customers of Japanese financial institutions.

Dubbed “Tsukuba” after the Japanese city, the malware is not very sophisticated from a technical standpoint, but its social engineering engineering techniques make it highly efficient in harvesting personal and financial information, researchers said.

Tsukuba is a proxy changer malware that hijacks victims’ browsers in an effort to redirect them to malicious websites.

The Trojan is distributed through spam emails. Once it’s executed, the threat leverages the Windows PowerShell scripting tool to hide its presence while it communicates with the command and control (C&C) server and downloads components.

In order to evade detection and prevent researchers from analyzing it, Tsukuba scans the list of running processes to see if any proxy detection tools or virtualization software are present. If such applications are detected, the malware stops the installation process.

If the presence of a virtual environment is not detected, the Trojan copies browser cookies and checks them to see if the victim has visited any of the targeted financial websites. This allows the cybercriminals to determine if it’s worth infecting the machine.

Once it’s installed on a device, the malware creates a malicious Proxy Auto-Config (PAC) file so that Web browser such as Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer redirect victims to the attackers’ URLs. The attackers don’t want to waste any resources on non-Japanese users so only individuals browsing from a Japanese IP address are directed to phishing pages, while others are presented with an error message.

IBM researchers have pointed out that unlike traditional phishing pages, the ones set up by the cybercrooks behind Tsukuba are highly customized and interactive.

Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.

“The look and feel is dynamically pulled from the legitimate bank’s portal, and the fake pages actually interact with the victim via pop-ups. In Tsukuba’s case, after victims enter their credentials, the pop-ups proceed to ask them for personal details and to upload clear images of their official documentation and passport,” IBM Trusteer threat engineer Dani Abramov explained in a blog post. “Looking at similar malware of Tsukuba’s grade, this extensive social engineering component definitely goes far beyond the common.”

In order to avoid raising suspicion when victims access the fake banking sites through the rogue proxy, the attackers install a root certificate on the infected machine.

Once a user’s information is harvested, the proxy settings are restored. In case victims become suspicious, they will not be able to reach the phishing page for a second time, and instead they will be presented with the legitimate website.

There aren’t many banking Trojans designed to target users in Japan, partly because it’s easier for cybercriminals to create phishing pages and spam emails written in English than it is in Japanese. Many users don’t expect to be targeted in such attacks, which makes them more likely to fall for the tricks employed by Tsukuba.

Last year, the security industry and law enforcement conducted several operations aimed at disrupting financial malware. As a result, according to Symantec, the number of financial Trojans dropped by 53% and the number of traditional phishing emails dropped by 74% in 2014.

Written By

Eduard Kovacs (@EduardKovacs) is a managing editor at SecurityWeek. He worked as a high school IT teacher for two years before starting a career in journalism as Softpedia’s security news reporter. Eduard holds a bachelor’s degree in industrial informatics and a master’s degree in computer techniques applied in electrical engineering.

Click to comment

Trending

Daily Briefing Newsletter

Subscribe to the SecurityWeek Email Briefing to stay informed on the latest threats, trends, and technology, along with insightful columns from industry experts.

Understand how to go beyond effectively communicating new security strategies and recommendations.

Register

Join us for an in depth exploration of the critical nature of software and vendor supply chain security issues with a focus on understanding how attacks against identity infrastructure come with major cascading effects.

Register

Expert Insights

Related Content

Cybercrime

The changing nature of what we still generally call ransomware will continue through 2023, driven by three primary conditions.

Cybercrime

A recently disclosed vBulletin vulnerability, which had a zero-day status for roughly two days last week, was exploited in a hacker attack targeting the...

Malware & Threats

The NSA and FBI warn that a Chinese state-sponsored APT called BlackTech is hacking into network edge devices and using firmware implants to silently...

Application Security

Virtualization technology giant VMware on Tuesday shipped urgent updates to fix a trio of security problems in multiple software products, including a virtual machine...

Malware & Threats

Unpatched and unprotected VMware ESXi servers worldwide have been targeted in a ransomware attack exploiting a vulnerability patched in 2021.

Cyberwarfare

An engineer recruited by intelligence services reportedly used a water pump to deliver Stuxnet, which reportedly cost $1-2 billion to develop.

Malware & Threats

Apple’s cat-and-mouse struggles with zero-day exploits on its flagship iOS platform is showing no signs of slowing down.

Cybercrime

No one combatting cybercrime knows everything, but everyone in the battle has some intelligence to contribute to the larger knowledge base.