Malware Analysis Report (AR21-048E)

This report is provided "as is" for informational purposes only. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained herein. The DHS does not endorse any commercial product or service referenced in this bulletin or otherwise.

This document is marked TLP:WHITE--Disclosure is not limited. Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release. Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction. For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol (TLP), see http://www.us-cert.gov/tlp.

Description

This Malware Analysis Report (MAR) is the result of analytic efforts among the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Department of Treasury (Treasury) to highlight the cyber threat to cryptocurrency posed by North Korea, formally known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), and provide mitigation recommendations. Working with U.S. government partners, FBI, CISA, and Treasury assess that Lazarus Group—which these agencies attribute to North Korean state-sponsored advanced persistent threat (APT) actors—is targeting individuals and companies, including cryptocurrency exchanges and financial service companies, through the dissemination of cryptocurrency trading applications that have been modified to include malware that facilitates theft of cryptocurrency.

This MAR highlights this cyber threat posed by North Korea and provides detailed indicators of compromise (IOCs) used by the North Korean government. The U.S. Government refers to malicious cyber activity by the North Korean government as HIDDEN COBRA. For more information on other versions of AppleJeus and recommended steps to mitigate this threat, see Joint Cybersecurity Advisory AA21-048A: AppleJeus: Analysis of North Korea's Cryptocurrency Malware at https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/AA21-048A.

There have been multiple versions of AppleJeus malware discovered since its initial discovery in August 2018. In most versions, the malware appears to be from a legitimate-looking cryptocurrency trading company and website, whereby an unsuspecting individual downloads a third-party application from a website that appears legitimate.

The U.S. Government has identified AppleJeus malware version—CoinGoTrade—and associated IOCs used by the North Korean government in AppleJeus operations.

CoinGoTrade discovered in October 2020, is a legitimate-looking cryptocurrency trading software that is marketed and distributed by a company and website—CoinGoTrade and coingotrade[.]com, respectively—that appear legitimate. Some information has been redacted from this report to preserve victim anonymity.

For a downloadable copy of IOCs, see: MAR-10322463-5.v1.stix.

Submitted Files (7)

326d7836d580c08cf4b5e587434f6e5011ebf2284bbf3e7c083a8f41dac36ddd (CoinGoTradeUpgradeDaemon)

[Redacted] (CoinGoTrade.msi)

3e5442440aea07229a1bf6ca2fdf78c5e2e5eaac312a325ccb49d45da14f97f4 (CoinGoTrade.exe)

527792dfab79f026eaa6930d2109c93e816ed31826dba0338a9223db71aced18 (CoinGo_Trade)

572a124f5665be68eaa472590f3ba75bf34b0ea2942b5fcbfd3e74654202dd09 (CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe)

5e40d106977017b1ed235419b1e59ff090e1f43ac57da1bb5d80d66ae53b1df8 (prtspool)

[Redacted] (CoinGoTrade.dmg)

Domains (4)

airbseeker.com

coingotrade.com

globalkeystroke.com

woodmate.it

IPs (1)

23.152.0.101

[Redacted]

Tags

dropper

Details

Antivirus

YARA Rules

No matches found.

ssdeep Matches

No matches found.

Relationships

Description

This Windows program from the CoinGoTrade site is a Windows MSI Installer. The installer appears to be legitimate and will install "CoinGoTrade.exe" (3e5442440aea07229a1bf6ca2fdf78c5e2e5eaac312a325ccb49d45da14f97f4) in the “C:\Program Files (x86)\CoinGoTrade” folder. It will also install "CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe" (572a124f5665be68eaa472590f3ba75bf34b0ea2942b5fcbfd3e74654202dd09) in the “C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\CoinGoTradeSupport” folder. Immediately after installation, the installer launches "CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe." During installation, a "CoinGoTrade" folder containing the "CoinGoTrade.exe" application is added to the start menu.

Screenshots

coingotrade.com

URLs

• coingotrade.com/update_coingotrade.php
• hxxps[:]//coingotrade.com/download/[GUID]

Whois

Whois for coingotrade.com had the following information:
Registrar: NAMECHEAP INC
Creation Date: 2020-02-28
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-02-28

Relationships

Description

The domain "coingotrade.com" had a legitimately signed Sectigo Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate, which was “Domain Control Validated," similar to the domain certificates for previous AppleJeus variants. Investigation revealed the point of contact listed for verification was support[@]coingotrade.com. No other contact information was available as the administrative or technical contact for the coingotrade.com domain.

The domain is registered with NameCheap at the IP address 198.54.114.175 with ASN 22612.

Investigation revealed the IP address 198.54.114.175 was hosted at NameCheap, but no records were available at the time of writing.

Screenshots

3e5442440aea07229a1bf6ca2fdf78c5e2e5eaac312a325ccb49d45da14f97f4

Tags

trojan

Details

Antivirus

YARA Rules

No matches found.

ssdeep Matches

No matches found.

PE Metadata

PE Sections

Packers/Compilers/Cryptors

Relationships

Description

This file is a 32-bit Windows executable contained within the Windows MSI Installer "CoinGoTrade.msi." When executed, "CoinGoTrade.exe" loads a legitimate looking cryptocurrency wallet application with no signs of malicious activity. The strings for "CoinGoTrade.exe" contain the command and control (C2) "hxxp[:]//23.152.0.101:8080/ which was also identified in the MacOS CoinGo_Trade (527792dfab79f026eaa6930d2109c93e816ed31826dba0338a9223db71aced18) and the Kupay Wallet Stage 2 from AppleJeus version 4. In addition, a build path is present in the strings “U:\work\CryptoMex\teobot\teobot\obj\Release\CoinGoTrade.pdb" and the file properties description also states “CryptoMex." CryptoMex is likely an open source cryptocurrency application which was copied in order to create this application.

Screenshots

23.152.0.101

Tags

command-and-control

Ports

• 8080 TCP

Whois

Queried whois.arin.net with "n 23.152.0.101"...

NetRange:     23.152.0.0 - 23.152.0.255
CIDR:         23.152.0.0/24
NetName:        CROWNCLOUD-V6V4
NetHandle:     NET-23-152-0-0-1
Parent:         NET23 (NET-23-0-0-0-0)
NetType:        Direct Allocation
OriginAS:     AS8100
Organization: Crowncloud US LLC (CUL-34)
RegDate:        2015-11-23
Updated:        2015-11-23
Comment:        IPs in this block are statically assigned, please report any abuse to admin@crowncloud.us
Ref:            https://rdap.arin.net/registry/ip/23.152.0.0


OrgName:        Crowncloud US LLC
OrgId:         CUL-34
Address:        530 W 6th St
Address:        C/O Cid 4573 Quadranet Inc. Ste 901
City:         Los Angeles
StateProv:     CA
PostalCode:     90014-1207
Country:        US
RegDate:        2014-07-25
Updated:        2017-10-10
Ref:            https://rdap.arin.net/registry/entity/CUL-34


OrgTechHandle: CROWN9-ARIN
OrgTechName: Crowncloud Support
OrgTechPhone: +1-940-867-4072
OrgTechEmail: admin@crowncloud.us
OrgTechRef:    https://rdap.arin.net/registry/entity/CROWN9-ARIN

OrgAbuseHandle: CROWN9-ARIN
OrgAbuseName: Crowncloud Support
OrgAbusePhone: +1-940-867-4072
OrgAbuseEmail: admin@crowncloud.us
OrgAbuseRef:    https://rdap.arin.net/registry/entity/CROWN9-ARIN

Relationships

Description

This IP address is the C2 for "CoinGoTrade.exe" and "CoinGo_Trade."

572a124f5665be68eaa472590f3ba75bf34b0ea2942b5fcbfd3e74654202dd09

Tags

trojan

Details

Antivirus

YARA Rules

No matches found.

ssdeep Matches

PE Metadata

PE Sections

Packers/Compilers/Cryptors

Relationships

Description

This file is a 32-bit Windows executable contained within the Windows MSI Installer "CoinGoTrade.msi." When executed, CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe will installs itself as a service, which will automatically start when any user logs on. The service is installed with the description of “Automatic CoinGoTrade Upgrade."

After installing the service, "CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe" has similar behavior to the updater component for AppleJeus version 4 "Kupay Wallet." On startup "CoinGoUpdate.exe" allocates memory to write a file. After allocating the memory and storing the hard-coded string “Latest” in a variable, the program attempts to open a network connection. The connection is named "CoinGoTrade 1.0 (Check Update Windows)," which is likely to avoid suspicion from a user.

Similarly, to previous AppleJeus variants, "CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe" collects some basic information from the system as well as a timestamp, and places the collected information in hard-coded format strings. Specifically, the timestamp is placed into a format string “ver=%d&timestamp=%lu” where "ver" is set as the 1000, possibly referring to the CoinGoTrade version previously mentioned. This basic information and hard-coded strings are sent via a POST to the C2 "coingotrade.com/update_coingotrade.php." If the POST is successful (i.e. returns an HTTP response status code of 200) but fails any of multiple different checks, "CoinGoTradeUpdate.exe" will sleep for two minutes and then regenerate the timestamp and contact the C2 again.

After receiving the payload from the C2, the program writes the payload to memory and executes the payload.

The payload for the Windows malware could not be downloaded, as the C2 server "coingotrade.com/coingotrade_update.php" was no longer accessible. In addition, the sample was not identified in open source reporting for this sample. The Windows payload is likely similar in functionality to "prtspool" (5e40d106977017b1ed235419b1e59ff090e1f43ac57da1bb5d80d66ae53b1df8) the OSX stage 2 sample.

Screenshots

[Redacted]

Tags

droppertrojan

Details

Antivirus

No matches found.

YARA Rules

No matches found.

ssdeep Matches

No matches found.

Relationships

Description

This OSX program from the CoinGoTrade site is an Apple DMG installer. The installer was hosted at hxxps[:]//coingotrade.com/[GUID]. The [GUID] is a unique file that is crafted for a specific victim and is being withheld to preserve the identity of the intended recipient. The OSX program is an Apple DMG installer with the file name CoinGoTrade.dmg.

The OSX program does not have a digital signature and will warn the user of that before installation. As all previous versions of AppleJeus, the CoinGoTrade installer appears to be legitimate and installs both “CoinGo_Trade” (527792dfab79f026eaa6930d2109c93e816ed31826dba0338a9223db71aced18) in the “/Applications/CoinGoTrade.app/Contents/MacOS/” folder and a program named "CoinGoTradeUpgradeDaemon" (326d7836d580c08cf4b5e587434f6e5011ebf2284bbf3e7c083a8f41dac36ddd) also in the “/Applications/CoinGoTrade.app/Contents/MacOS/” folder. The installer contains a postinstall script (Figure 5).

The postinstall script is identical in functionality to the postinstall scripts from previous AppleJeus variants and is identical to the AppleJeus variant 4 "Kupay" postinstall script without the "launchctl" command. The postinstall script creates a “CoinGoTradeService” folder in the OSX “/Library/Application Support” folder and moves "CoinGoTradeUpgradeDaemon" to it. The “Application Support” folder contains both system and third-party support files which are necessary for program operation. Typically, the subfolders have names matching those of the actual applications. At installation, CoinGoTrade placed the plist file (com.coingotrade.pkg.product.plist) in “/Library/LaunchDaemons/."

As the LaunchDaemon will not be run immediately after the plist file is moved, the postinstall script then launches the "CoinGoTradeUpgradeDaemon" program in the background.

Screenshots

527792dfab79f026eaa6930d2109c93e816ed31826dba0338a9223db71aced18

Tags

trojan

Details

Antivirus

No matches found.

YARA Rules

No matches found.

ssdeep Matches

No matches found.

Relationships

Description

This OSX sample was contained within Apple DMG installer "CoinGoTrade.dmg." "CoinGo _Trade" is likely a copy of an open source cryptocurrency application. The strings for "CoinGo_Trade" contain the C2 hxxp[:]//23.152.0.101:8080, which is also found in the Windows CoinGoTrade.exe (3e5442440aea07229a1bf6ca2fdf78c5e2e5eaac312a325ccb49d45da14f97f4) and the Kupay Wallet Stage 2 from AppleJeus version 4.

326d7836d580c08cf4b5e587434f6e5011ebf2284bbf3e7c083a8f41dac36ddd

Tags

backdoortrojan

Details

Antivirus

YARA Rules

No matches found.