"Researchers Spot Supply Chain Attack Targeting GitLab CI Pipelines"
Security researchers at SentinelLabs are calling attention to a software chain supply attack targeting Rust developers with malware aimed directly at infecting GitLab Continuous Integration (CI) pipelines. The researchers dubbed the campaign, CrateDepression, and it combines typosquatting and the impersonation of a known Rust developer to push a malicious ‘crate’ hosted on the Rust dependency community repository. A crate is a compilation unit in Rust. The researcher stated that the malicious crate was swiftly flagged and removed, but the researchers found a second-stage payload exclusively built to Gitlab CI pipelines, signaling a risk of further larger-scale supply-chain attacks. The researchers noted that given the nature of the victims targeted, this attack would serve as an enabler for subsequent supply-chain attacks at a larger-scale relative to the development pipelines infected. The researchers stated that an infected machine is inspected for the GITLAB_CI environment variable in an attempt to identify Continuous Integration (CI) pipelines for software development. On those systems, the adversaries pull a next-stage payload built on the ‘red-teaming’ post-exploitation framework Mythic. This second-stage payload contains a switch with a large array of tasking options, including the ability to capture screenshots, keyboard strokes, and the uploading and downloading of files. On macOS, the operator can choose to persist by either or both of a LaunchAgent/Daemon and a LoginItem. During the investigation, the researchers found 15 iterative versions of the malicious ‘rustdecimal’ as the adversaries tested different approaches and refinements. The researchers noted that while the ultimate intent of the attacker(s) is unknown, the intended targeting could lead to subsequent larger-scale supply-chain attacks depending on the GitLab CI pipelines infected.
SecurityWeek reports: "Researchers Spot Supply Chain Attack Targeting GitLab CI Pipelines"