hacker-news Aug 1, 2026 · Crawled Aug 1, 2026

Hijacked Hotel Wi-Fi Pushes Fake Updates to Deliver Surveillance Malware

3 Actors

AI Summary

A threat actor dubbed Storm-2945, assessed to be a sub-cluster of the Russian state-sponsored group APT29 (aka Cozy Bear), has hijacked hotel Wi-Fi networks to deliver a surveillance-focused remote access trojan named CornFlake. The attack abuses compromised captive portals to redirect users to fake browser or OS update prompts, which lead to the download of malicious payloads. The CornFlake malware, written in Go, establishes persistence via registry run keys and scheduled tasks, captures keystrokes, screenshots, microphone audio, and browser credentials, and can bypass Chrome's App-Bound Encryption. A related in-memory PowerShell stealer, ChocoShell, harvests Microsoft 365, Azure AD, and WAM tokens from the Token Broker cache. Attackers also leveraged Microsoft's device code authentication flow to gain MFA-satisfied access by tricking users into approving malicious sessions.

AI-extracted · verify before operational use

Extracted Entities 3 found

Threat Actor UNC2452 → Threat Actor APT29 → Threat Actor APT28 →

MITRE ATT&CK TTPs 23 techniques

T1003 OS Credential Dumping · Credential Access T1021.001 Remote Desktop Protocol · Lateral Movement T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information · Defense Evasion T1036 Masquerading · Defense Evasion T1036.005 Match Legitimate Name or Location · Defense Evasion T1053.005 Scheduled Task · Execution T1055 Process Injection · Defense Evasion T1055.001 Dynamic-link Library Injection · Defense Evasion T1059.001 PowerShell · Execution T1059.003 Windows Command Shell · Execution T1070.004 File Deletion · Defense Evasion T1071.001 Web Protocols · Command And Control T1090 Proxy · Command And Control T1136.001 Local Account · Persistence T1204.002 Malicious File · Execution T1558 Steal or Forge Kerberos Tickets · Credential Access T1566 Phishing · Initial Access T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment · Initial Access T1071.004 DNS · Command And Control T1078.004 Cloud Accounts · Defense Evasion T1114 Email Collection · Collection T1556.005 Reversible Encryption · Credential Access T1558.003 Kerberoasting · Credential Access