New Glove infostealer malware bypasses Chrome’s cookie encryption

New Glove infostealer malware bypasses Chrome’s cookie encryption

November 14, 2024 at 04:05PM

The new Glove Stealer malware can bypass Google Chrome’s App-Bound encryption to steal cookies and sensitive information from various browsers and applications. It employs social engineering tactics similar to ClickFix infections and requires local admin privileges to operate. Analysts note its basic methods indicate it remains in early development.

### Meeting Takeaways on New Glove Stealer Malware

1. **Malware Overview**:
– The new Glove Stealer malware can bypass Google Chrome’s Application-Bound encryption to steal browser cookies.
– Identified by Gen Digital security researchers during investigations into phishing campaigns, it is deemed to be in early development.

2. **Method of Attack**:
– Utilizes social engineering tactics similar to the ClickFix infection chain, tricking victims into installing malware via fake error windows in HTML attachments to phishing emails.
– Basic operational mechanism with minimal obfuscation noted, indicating potential early developmental status.

3. **Capabilities**:
– Extracts and exfiltrates cookies from major browsers: Firefox and Chromium-based (Chrome, Edge, Brave, Yandex, Opera).
– Can steal sensitive data such as:
– Cryptocurrency wallets from browser extensions.
– 2FA tokens from authenticators (Google, Microsoft, Aegis, and LastPass).
– Passwords from services like Bitwarden, LastPass, and KeePass.
– Emails from mail clients like Thunderbird.
– Targets over 280 browser extensions and 80 locally installed applications related to sensitive data.

4. **Bypassing Security**:
– Employs a method to bypass Google’s App-Bound encryption cookie-theft defenses, introduced in July (Chrome 127).
– Utilizes a supporting module interacting with the Chrome COM-based IElevator Windows service to decrypt and access encrypted keys, requiring local admin privileges for placement.

5. **Development Stage**:
– Considered to be in early development due to reliance on basic techniques that are already surpassed by more advanced info stealers.
– Despite needing admin privileges for operation, the prevalence of information-stealing malware campaigns continues to rise post-implementation of App-Bound encryption.

6. **Current Threat Landscape**:
– Ongoing attacks have escalated since July, exploiting various vulnerabilities—vulnerable drivers, zero-day exploits, malvertising, spearphishing, and through deceptive practices related to GitHub issues.

### Action Items:
– Continuous monitoring of emerging threats and malware techniques is essential.
– Assess and enhance organizational security measures against potential phishing and exploitation exploits.
– Educate employees on identifying and avoiding social engineering tactics.

Full Article