November 22, 2022

Good morning, everyone!

Beware of BatLoader

A dangerous new malware loader with features for determining whether it's on a business system or a personal computer has begun rapidly infecting systems worldwide over the past few months.

"If BatLoader lands on a personal computer, it will proceed with fraud, infostealing, and banking-based payloads like Ursnif," Keegan says. "If BatLoader detects that it's in an organizational environment, it will proceed with intrusion tools like Cobalt Strike and Syncro."

BatLoader is especially dangerous because it uses techniques that make it very difficult for typical antivirus/antimalware to detect. This means you have to protect yourself!

BatLoader is spreading via classic social engineering campaigns: using search engine optimization (SEO) poisoning attacks ("where adversaries artificially increase the search engine ranking of websites hosting their malware"), it lures victims to compromised websites masquerading as download pages for popular business software such as LogMeIn, Zoom, TeamViewer, and AnyDesk.

So, how do you protect yourself? Think before you click! Don't click on those popup boxes. Consult original sources of information: if you think you need an update to an app already installed, open that app and "Check for updates" -- that's where you get legit software, not malware.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Remember, you can read past editions of this newsletter on our website, along with tons more information under the Resources tab.

Have a great week!

Glenda R. Snodgrass
grs@theneteffect.com
(251) 433-0196 x107
https://www.theneteffect.com
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