The cyber-threat group has recently been targeting two subsidiaries of a major Asian conglomerate, which apparently specializes in materials and composites. The attack follows right after another distinct campaign against the Asian material sector. 

The APT attack was seen utilizing the Winnkit backdoor, Mimikatz, and several tools for credential dumping, screen capture, process hollowing, SQL querying, memory dumping (ForkPlayground), and proxy configuration. 

In one of the instances, Symantec discovered a material research organization in Asia that was being targeted by a previously unidentified threat group named ‘Clasiopa,’ which does not seem to be linked to the APTs. 

It is believed that Clasiopa acquired access to the targeted organization by brute forcing public facing servers and using a variety of post-exploitation tools like Atharvan remote access trojan (RAT), which is a modified version of the Lilith RAT, the Thumbsender hacking tool, and a custom proxy tool. The threat actor, according to Symantec, utilized the backdoors to compile lists of files and exfiltrate them, deleted logs, set a scheduled task to list file names, and verified the IP addresses of the compromised machines in an effort to disable endpoint protections. 

Moreover, it appears that Clasiopa used authorised software from Agile and Domino throughout the attack, but it is still unclear whether the attackers actually deployed the tools or simply abused the existing installations. Apparently Atharvan backdoor is able to download arbitrary files from the server, execute files, and configure communications through the C&C server, all based on the commands received from its operators. 

Adding to this, the Atharvan RAT can terminate or restart programs, send remote commands and PowerShell scripts, as well as terminate and uninstall itself. Further analysis on Atharvan revealed a Hindi mutex and a password, suggesting that Clasiopa could be based in India, although Symantec says that these could be some of the false flags planted by the threat group to muddle with the investigation.