An Overview of The Increasing Wiper Malware Threat
An Overview of The Increasing Wiper Malware Threat
In parallel with the war in Ukraine, cybersecurity researchers have witnessed a sudden
increase in the number of wiper malware deployments. Although these haven't been
officially attributed to Russian state-sponsored threat actors, their goals align with the
Russian military's. It is widely theorized that these cyberattacks are intentionally being
launched in concert with the invasion.
With wiper malware in the spotlight, we at FortiGuard Labs wanted to provide more
information on this threat to help organizations understand it and implement better
protections against them. In this blog, the following topics will be discussed:
Shamoon, 2012: Used to attack Saudi Aramco and Qatar's RasGas oil
companies.
Dark Seoul, 2013: Attacked South Korean media and financial companies.
Shamoon, 2016: Returned to again attack Saud Arabian organizations.
NotPetya, 2017: Originally targeted Ukrainian organizations, but due to its self-
propagation capability, it became the most devastating malware to date.
Olympic Destroyer, 2018: Attack targeted against the Winter Olympics in South
Korea.
Ordinypt/GermanWiper, 2019: Targeted German organizations with phishing
emails in German.
Dustman, 2019: Iranian state-sponsored threat actors attacked Bapco, Bahrain's
national oil company.
ZeroCleare, 2020: Attacked energy companies in the Middle East.
WhisperKill, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the Ukraine-
Russia war.
WhisperGate, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the
Ukraine-Russia war.
HermeticWiper, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the
Ukraine-Russia war.
IsaacWiper, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the Ukraine-
Russia war.
CaddyWiper, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the
Ukraine-Russia war.
DoupleZero, 2022: Attacked Ukrainian organizations in parallel with the Ukraine-
Russia war.
AcidRain, 2022: Attacked Viasat's KA-SAT satellite service provider.
Financial Gain
In general, financial gain is the least significant motivator for wiper malware. This is
understandable because it is hard to monetize destruction. However, one aspect we
wanted to point out here is the fake ransomware variant that pretends to encrypt data
and ask for a ransom, but without the capability to recover data. This could be called a
ransomware scam because the ransomware concept is fraudulent. Threat actors
employing such techniques are simply looking to make a quick buck without investing in
developing an actual ransomware tool or in the administration work behind an actual
ransomware operation. Of course, such an enterprise is short-lived because once it gets
out that it is not possible to recover data, nobody will pay the ransom.
Destruction of Evidence
This is a hard-to-prove motivator, but sometimes when there is no other reason to
deploy a wiper in an attack, it may be concluded that the real reason was something
else, such as espionage. The wiper is only deployed after the true goal of the attack is
achieved. Instead of meticulously erasing their tracks and all evidence of their attack,
the attackers simply deploy a wiper malware in the organization. This not only erases
the evidence, but the scale of the destruction causes the defenders to focus on the
recovery of data and operations and not on investigating the intrusion.
Sabotage
Sabotage is the most obvious reason to deploy a wiper. Just as the Stuxnet malware
was used to destroy centrifuges to slow down Iran's efforts to develop nuclear weapons,
wiper malware could be used to destroy data, sabotage development, cause financial
loss, or just cause chaos.
Cyberwar
A few months ago, it would not have been as straightforward to include this motivation
in the list. But at the time of this post, seven different wiper malware attacks
(WhisperKill, WhisperGate, HermeticWiper, IsaacWiper, CaddyWiper, DoubleZero,
AcidRain) have been discovered targeting Ukrainian infrastructure or Ukrainian
companies—all clearly in line with Russia's interest in the Ukraine-Russia war.
Generally, wiper operations in this category attack targets whose destruction is in the
interest of the opposing military. For example, the motivation behind such an attack
might be to cripple critical infrastructure. This could be done to either cause chaos and
increase mental stress on the enemy or to cause destruction at a tactical target. Wiper
attacks can also have a devastating effect against OT and critical infrastructure targets,
which has its value in a war.
An interesting and recent example is the suspicion that the AcidRain wiper was used in
an attack against the Viasat KA-SAT satellite broadband service provider. The attacker
gained access to the management infrastructure of the provider to deploy AcidRain on
KA-SAT modems used in Ukraine. The attack also rendered 5,800 wind turbines
inaccessible in Germany.
Interesting Properties
Although the general objective of wiper malware is quite simple, some have interesting
properties worth discussing.
Fake Ransomware
As seen previously with Ordinypt, a sample can follow the ransomware business
model without the intention to recover files.
It can be used to mislead the incident response team and, with that, slow down
countermeasures.
Hide the motivation behind an attack. Ransomware would suggest cybercrime,
which could be a way to hide that the real motivation is sabotage or cyberwar.
Self-Propagation
As with NotPetya, we can see that a significant property of wipers is whether or not they
are self-propagating. If it is a worm, such as NotPetya, it will self-propagate to other
machines once it is let loose. It is not necessarily possible to control them any longer in
such a case.
Overwriting Files
The most trivial approach for wipers is to simply enumerate the filesystem and overwrite
the selected files with data. We discussed earlier that Ordinypt used this approach,
overwriting files with zero (0x00) bytes.
Encrypting Files
As mentioned earlier, encrypting a file and destroying the key is essentially equivalent to
destroying the file. Of course, a brute-force attempt could be made to recover the file,
but if proper encryption algorithms are used, this approach is quite hopeless. However,
encryption rather than simply overwriting is very resource-intensive and slows down the
malware. The only use case for implementing encryption in a wiper is when the authors
want to keep up the appearance of being ransomware for as long as possible. This was
the case with NotPetya, which did encrypt files properly.
Overwriting MBR
Many wipers also make sure to overwrite the Master Boot Record (MBR) of the disk.
This part of a disk tells the computer how to boot the operating system. If the MBR is
destroyed, the computer won't start. However, this does not mean that the data on the
hard disk has been destroyed. If only the MBR is corrupted, the data can still be
recovered. By itself, it can only be used to cause chaos and confusion, but no actual
data loss. That is why it is usually used together with other techniques.
For instance, the ZeroCleare malware used against energy companies in the Middle
East in 2019 also used this technique. It used the third-party driver management tool
EldoS RawDisk (more on that later) to directly access hard drives bypassing the
protection mechanisms of the operating system (OS). Instead of overwriting files on the
OS level, ZeroCleare overwrites the disks directly with 0x55 bytes. This, of course,
starts with the MBR and continues with all partitions. A very clever technique we should
mention when talking about ZeroCleare is that it bypassed the Windows Driver
Signature Enforcement(DSG), which protects Windows from loading unsigned drivers
(RawDisk driver). To do that, it first loaded a publicly available known vulnerable signed
driver of VirtualBox. It then exploited the vulnerability in this legitimate driver to load
RawDisk's unsigned driver. Once that happened, it had direct access to the disks in the
machine.
Overwriting MFT
MFT stands for Master File Table, and it exists on every NTFS filesystem. This is
basically a catalog of all the files that exist on the filesystem, their metadata, and either
the file content or the location where the file content is stored. If the MFT is corrupted,
the operating system won't be able to find the files. This is a very easy and fast way for
wiper malware to make files disappear. The one drawback is similar to corrupting the
MBR: the file content is not necessarily destroyed. While the few files stored directly in
the MFT would be erased, most of the files are stored somewhere else on the disk, and
the MFT only provides their location to the OS. Without the MFT, the OS won't be able
to find the content, but the content is still there on the disk.
Using IOCTL
IOCTL is the device input and output control interface in Windows. The
DeviceIoControl() function is a general-purpose interface used to send control codes to
devices. The control codes are essentially operations to be executed by the device
driver. Malware uses this interface to collect information about the disks targeted for the
actual wiping.
In the case of HermeticWiper, IOCTLs were used for the following purposes:
Once HermeticWiper collects all the data it wants to erase to maximize the impact of the
wiping, it uses the EaseUS Partition Master driver to overwrite the selected parts of the
disk with random data.
Third-party tooling
It was previously mentioned that malware sometimes uses third-party tools to overwrite
data. They usually use the Windows driver of off-the-shelf products to bypass the
protection mechanisms of Windows and manipulate the disks directly. The primary
reason for using third-party drivers is probably that poorly implemented drivers can
easily crash the whole system, which would lead to investigation and detection.
Attackers likely don't want to invest time into writing their own drivers. Another reason
might be that only signed drivers are allowed to be loaded on modern Windows
systems, so if they wrote their own driver, they would need to bypass this security
mechanism. This is, of course, not impossible, as we saw with ZeroCleare, which first
loads a signed but vulnerable driver and then exploits that vulnerability to load the
unsigned driver.
EldoS RawDisk, used by the Shamoon and ZeroCleare wipers and the Lazarus
Group in their infamous Sony Hack.
EaseUS Partition Master used by HermeticWiper
As shown in the examples above, most wipers are not using just one technique but a
combination. Wipers employ varying complexity in trying to reach their goals. The more
complex the malware is, the more techniques it needs to use. And, of course, the more
techniques are used, the lower the probability that the data can be recovered.
Fortinet Telemetry
Figure 3 shows Fortinet Anti-Virus (AV) detection numbers since January 2022 of
various wiper malware signatures. We can see that there was a significant increase. It is
also interesting to see that there is still a lot of NotPetya detection, which can be
explained by the fact that it is a worm so as long as there are vulnerable machines out
there NotPetya will keep self-propagating. We can also see how the war specific new
wipers appeared in March and increased the numbers significantly.
Fortinet Protection
Fortinet products detect all malware discussed in this blog.
HermeticWiper:
W32/KillDisk.NCV!tr
W32/Agent.OJC!worm
IsaacWiper:
W32/KillMBR.NHQ!tr
CaddyWiper:
W32/CaddyWiper.NCX!tr
WhisperKill:
W32/KillFiles.NKU!tr.ransom
WhisperGate:
W32/KillMBR.NGI!tr
MSIL/Agent.FP!tr.dldr
MSIL/Agent.QWILJV!tr
W32/KillFiles.NKU!tr.ransom
MSIL/VVH!tr
MSIL/Agent.VVH!tr
Shamoon:
W32/DISTTRACK.C!tr
W32/Generic.BQYIIWO!tr
W64/DistTrack.A!tr
Malware_Generic.P0
DistTrack.Botnet
Ordinypt:
W32/Ordinypt.5873!tr.ransom
Olympic Destroyer:
W32/OlympicDestroyer.A!tr
NotPetya:
W32/Petya.EOB!tr
W32/Petya.A!tr.ransom
W64/Petya.BG!tr
Dustman:
W32/Agent.F0FC!tr
W64/Dustman.KH!tr
W32/Distrack!tr
ZeroCleare:
W32/Agent.XACVYS!tr
W32/Distrack!tr
DoubleZero:
MSIL/DZeroWiper.CK!tr
AcidRain:
ELF/AcidRain.A!tr
Ordinypt
085256b114079911b64f5826165f85a28a2a4ddc2ce0d935fa8545651ce5ab09
Olympic Destroyer:
edb1ff2521fb4bf748111f92786d260d40407a2e8463dcd24bb09f908ee13eb9
19ab44a1343db19741b0e0b06bacce55990b6c8f789815daaf3476e0cc30ebea
ab5bf79274b6583a00be203256a4eacfa30a37bc889b5493da9456e2d5885c7f
f188abc33d351c2254d794b525c5a8b79ea78acd3050cd8d27d3ecfc568c2936
ae9a4e244a9b3c77d489dee8aeaf35a7c3ba31b210e76d81ef2e91790f052c85
D934CB8D0EADB93F8A57A9B8853C5DB218D5DB78C16A35F374E413884D915016
EDB1FF2521FB4BF748111F92786D260D40407A2E8463DCD24BB09F908EE13EB9
3E27B6B287F0B9F7E85BFE18901D961110AE969D58B44AF15B1D75BE749022C2
28858CC6E05225F7D156D1C6A21ED11188777FA0A752CB7B56038D79A88627CC
NotPetya:
be2fb06b0a61f72d901ea3d650912bb12ef94896528cca6f8f9466e49c1d0721
027cc450ef5f8c5f653329641ec1fed91f694e0d229928963b30f6b0d7d3a745
eae9771e2eeb7ea3c6059485da39e77b8c0c369232f01334954fbac1c186c998
02ef73bd2458627ed7b397ec26ee2de2e92c71a0e7588f78734761d8edbdcd9f
Dustman:
18c92f23b646eb85d67a890296000212091f930b1fe9e92033f123be3581a90f
f07b0c79a8c88a5760847226af277cf34ab5508394a58820db4db5a8d0340fc7
2fc39463b6db44873c9c07724ac28b63cdd72f5863a4a7064883e3afdd141f8d
ZeroCleare:
becb74a8a71a324c78625aa589e77631633d0f15af1473dfe34eca06e7ec6b86
2fc39463b6db44873c9c07724ac28b63cdd72f5863a4a7064883e3afdd141f8d
05aae309d7a8c562b3cf364a906b3fcb764c122855c7260697d96f83fc8ccee8
HermeticWiper:
0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c1210597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da
1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591
a259e9b0acf375a8bef8dbc27a8a1996ee02a56889cba07ef58c49185ab033ec
3c557727953a8f6b4788984464fb77741b821991acbf5e746aebdd02615b1767
06086c1da4590dcc7f1e10a6be3431e1166286a9e7761f2de9de79d7fda9c397
2c10b2ec0b995b88c27d141d6f7b14d6b8177c52818687e4ff8e6ecf53adf5bf
IsaacWiper:
13037b749aa4b1eda538fda26d6ac41c8f7b1d02d83f47b0d187dd645154e033
CaddyWiper:
a294620543334a721a2ae8eaaf9680a0786f4b9a216d75b55cfd28f39e9430ea
b66b179eac03afafdc69f62c207819eceecfbf994c9efa464fda0d2ba44fe2d7
WhisperGate:
a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92
dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78
WhisperKill:
34ca75a8c190f20b8a7596afeb255f2228cb2467bd210b2637965b61ac7ea907
191ca4833351e2e82cb080a42c4848cfbc4b1f3e97250f2700eff4e97cf72019
24e9b86b92918c3731fa6126c70532c79507c8041b8e6bf1e1c007aa8a9ac025
6aa4081d4028116bb50315774f0d5dfd45dfb9b9f61f172cfa53bfc65eddf229
DoubleZero:
3b2e708eaa4744c76a633391cf2c983f4a098b46436525619e5ea44e105355fe
8dd8b9bd94de1e72f0c400c5f32dcefc114cc0a5bf14b74ba6edc19fd4aeb2a5
30b3cbe8817ed75d8221059e4be35d5624bd6b5dc921d4991a7adc4c3eb5de4a
d897f07ae6f42de8f35e2b05f5ef5733d7ec599d5e786d3225e66ca605a48f53
AcidRain
9b4dfaca873961174ba935fddaf696145afe7bbf5734509f95feb54f3584fd9a
ATT&CK TTPs
ID Name
T1485 Data Destruction
T1486 Data Encrypted for Impact
T1561 Disk Wipe
T1561.001 Disk Wipe: Disk Content Wipe
T1561.002 Disk Wipe: Disk Structure Wipe
T1495 Firmware Corruption
T1529 System Shutdown/Reboot
T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task
T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution
T1542.001 Pre-OS Boot: System Firmware
T1542.002 Pre-OS Boot: Component Firmware
T1542.003 Pre-OS Boot: Bootkit
T1006 Direct Volume Access
T1562.001 Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools
T1070.004 Indicator Removal on Host: File Deletion
T1083 File and Directory Discovery
Further Reading
Shamoon - https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/research-furtive-
malware-rises-again
Olympic Destroyer - https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/02/olympic-
destroyer.html
Dustman - https://www.zdnet.com/article/new-iranian-data-wiper-malware-hits-
bapco-bahrains-national-oil-company/
NotPetya - https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/petrwrap-ransomware-technical-
analysis-triple-threat-file-encryption-mft-encryption-credential-theft/
NotPetya - https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/key-differences-
between-petya-and-notpetya
ZeroCleare - https://www.ibm.com/downloads/cas/OAJ4VZNJ
CaddyWiper - https://www.fortiguard.com/encyclopedia/virus/10082978
HermeticWiper
- https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/03/hermeticwiper-a-
detailed-analysis-of-the-destructive-malware-that-targeted-ukraine/
WhisperGate - https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-
malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/
AcidRain - https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/acidrain-a-modem-wiper-rains-
down-on-europe/
DoubleZero - https://cert.gov.ua/article/38088
WhisperKill - https://cert.gov.ua/article/18101