First discovered in 2019, the InterPlanetary Storm malware has resurfaced with a new variant targeting Mac and Android along with Windows and Linux machines, as per the findings by researchers at IT security firm, Barracuda Networks.
The malware is known as ‘InterPlanetary Storm’ as it makes use of InterPlanetary File System (IFES) peer-to-peer (p2p) network - using a legitimate p2p network makes it difficult to identify the malicious traffic because it gets intermixed with legitimate traffic. The malware targets Windows machines and lets the attacker execute any arbitrary PowerShell code on the compromised systems.
“The malware detects the CPU architecture and running OS of its victims, and it can run on ARM-based machines, an architecture that is quite common with routers and other IoT devices,” the researchers noted.
The earlier versions of the Interplanetary Storm malware that surfaced in May 2019 compromised Windows-based devices, however, by June 2019; the botnet could also infect Linux machines. The new versions with add-on capabilities attempt to infect machines via a dictionary attack, it’s a form of brute force attack technique that involves breaking into a password-protected system by systematically guessing passwords. The most recent version detected in August is configured to infect Mac along with IoT devices like televisions running the Android OS, as per a report published on Thursday by Barracuda Networks.
In the report, Erez Turjeman, a researcher with Barracuda, says, "The malware detects the CPU architecture and running OS of its victims, and it can run on ARM-based machines, an architecture that is quite common with routers and other [internet of things] devices.” "The malware is called InterPlanetary Storm because it uses the InterPla ..
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