FTP Hack Attack!
A database containing more than 8700 harvested FTP account credentials, including username, password and server address has been uncovered. These stolen credentials enable criminals to compromise servers and automatically inject crimeware to infect users visiting them. We’re all gonna die!
Among those stolen accounts are those of Fortune-level global companies in a wide range of industries including manufacturing, telecom, media, online retail, IT, as well as government agencies. The stolen FTP accounts include some of the world’s top 100 domains as ranked by Alexa.com.
The plot thickens. Details have emerged of the workings of an insidious new application, especially designed to abuse and trade stolen FTP account credentials of legitimate companies around the world. A trading interface is used to qualify the stolen accounts in terms of country of residence of the FTP server and Google page ranking of the compromised server.
This information enables cunning cybercriminals to devise cost for the compromised FTP credentials for resale to other cybercriminals or to adjust the attack on more prominent sites. The trading application also allows the cybercriminal to manage FTP credential information to automatically inject IFRAME tags to Web pages on the compromised server.
Software-as-a-Service has been evolving for sometime, but until now, it has been applied only to legitimate applications. With this new trading application, cybercriminals have an instant ‘solution’ to their ‘problem’ of gaining access to FTP credentials and thus infecting both the legitimate Web sites and its unsuspecting visitors. All of this can be easily achieved with just one push of a button.
