Microsoft Defender for Identity Archives | Microsoft Security Blog http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/product/microsoft-defender-for-identity/ Expert coverage of cybersecurity topics Fri, 10 Apr 2026 21:54:03 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.3 SOHO router compromise leads to DNS hijacking and adversary-in-the-middle attacks http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2026/04/07/soho-router-compromise-leads-to-dns-hijacking-and-adversary-in-the-middle-attacks/ Tue, 07 Apr 2026 14:00:00 +0000 Executive summary Forest Blizzard, a threat actor linked to the Russian military, has been compromising insecure home and small-office internet equipment like routers, then modifying their settings in ways that turn them into part of the actor’s malicious infrastructure.

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]]>
  1. DNS hijacking attack chain: From compromised devices to AiTM and other follow-on activity
  2. Mitigation and protection guidance
  3. Microsoft Defender detection and hunting guidance

Executive summary

Forest Blizzard, a threat actor linked to the Russian military, has been compromising insecure home and small-office internet equipment like routers, then modifying their settings in ways that turn them into part of the actor’s malicious infrastructure. The threat actor then hides behind this legitimate but compromised infrastructure to spy on additional targets or conduct follow-on attacks. Microsoft Threat Intelligence is sharing information on this campaign to increase awareness of the risks associated with insecure home and small-office internet routing devices and give users and organizations tools to mitigate, detect, and hunt for these threats where they might be impacted. 

Since at least August 2025, the Russian military intelligence actor Forest Blizzard, and its sub-group tracked as Storm-2754, has conducted a large-scale exploitation of vulnerable small office/home office (SOHO) devices to hijack Domain Name System (DNS) requests and facilitate the collection of network traffic. For nation-state actors like Forest Blizzard, DNS hijacking enables persistent, passive visibility and reconnaissance at scale.

By compromising edge devices that are upstream of larger targets, threat actors can take advantage of less closely monitored or managed assets to pivot into enterprise environments. Microsoft Threat Intelligence has identified over 200 organizations and 5,000 consumer devices impacted by Forest Blizzard’s malicious DNS infrastructure; telemetry did not indicate compromise of Microsoft-owned assets or services.

Forest Blizzard, which primarily collects intelligence in support of Russian government foreign policy initiatives, has also leveraged its DNS hijacking activity to support post-compromise adversary-in-the-middle (AiTM) attacks on Transport Layer Security (TLS) connections against Microsoft Outlook on the web domains. This activity enables the interception of cloud-hosted content, impacting numerous sectors including government, information technology (IT), telecommunications, and energy—all usual targets for this actor.

While the number of organizations specifically targeted for TLS AiTM is only a subset of the networks with vulnerable SOHO devices, Microsoft Threat Intelligence assesses that the threat actor’s broad access could enable larger-scale AiTM attacks, which might include active traffic interception. Targeting SOHO devices is not a new tactic, technique, or procedure (TTP) for Russian military intelligence actors, but this is the first time Microsoft has observed Forest Blizzard using DNS hijacking at scale to support AiTM of TLS connections after exploiting edge devices.

In this blog, we share our analysis of the TTPs used by Forest Blizzard in this campaign to illustrate how threat actors leverage this attack surface. We’re also outlining mitigation and protection recommendations to reduce exposure from compromised SOHO devices, as well as Microsoft Defender detection and hunting guidance to help defenders identify and investigate related malicious activity. It’s important for organizations to account for unmanaged SOHO devices—particularly those used by remote and hybrid employees—since compromised home and small‑office network infrastructure can expose cloud access and sensitive data even when enterprise environments and cloud services themselves remain secure.

DNS hijacking attack chain: From compromised devices to AiTM and other follow-on activity

The following sections provide details on Forest Blizzard’s end-to-end attack chain for this campaign, from initial access on vulnerable SOHO routers to actor-controlled DNS resolution and AiTM activity.

Figure 1. DNS hijacking through router compromise

Edge router compromise

Forest Blizzard gained access to SOHO devices then altered their default network configurations to use actor-controlled DNS resolvers. This malicious re-configuration resulted in thousands of devices sending their DNS requests to actor-controlled servers.

Typically, endpoint devices obtain network configuration settings from edge devices through Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP). Exploiting SOHO devices requires minimal investment while providing wide visibility on compromised devices, allowing the actor to collect DNS traffic and passively observe DNS requests, which could facilitate follow-on collection activity as described in the next section.

DNS hijacking

Forest Blizzard is almost certainly using the dnsmasq utility to perform DNS resolution and provide responses while listening on port 53 for DNS queries. The dnsmasq utility is a legitimate tool that provides lightweight network services widely used in home routers or smaller networks. Among its services are DNS forwarding and caching and a DHCP server, which collectively enable upstream DNS query forwarding and IP address assignment on a local network.

Adversary-in-the-middle attacks

Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed AiTM attacks related to the initial access campaign. Although they target different endpoints, both are Transport Layer Security (TLS) AiTM attacks, allowing the threat actor to collect data being transmitted.

In most cases, the DNS requests appear to have been transparently proxied by the actor’s infrastructure, resulting in connections to the legitimate service endpoints without interruption. However, in a limited number of compromises, the threat actor spoofed DNS responses for specifically targeted domains to force impacted endpoints to connect to infrastructure controlled by the threat actor.

The actor-controlled malicious infrastructure would then present an invalid TLS certificate to the victim, spoofing the legitimate Microsoft service. If the compromised user ignored warnings about the invalid TLS certificate, the threat actor could then actively intercept the underlying plaintext traffic—potentially including emails and other customer content— within the TLS connection. Since Forest Blizzard does not always conduct AiTM activity after achieving initial access through DNS hijacking, the actor is likely using it selectively against targets of intelligence priority post-compromise:

  • AiTM attack against Microsoft 365 domains: Microsoft observed Forest Blizzard conducting follow-on AiTM operations against a subset of domains associated with Microsoft Outlook on the web.
  • AiTM attack against specific government servers: Microsoft identified separate AiTM activity targeting non-Microsoft hosted servers in at least three government organizations in Africa, during which Forest Blizzard intercepted DNS requests and conducted follow-on collection.

Possible post-compromise activities

Forest Blizzard’s DNS hijacking and AiTM activity allows the actor to conduct DNS collection on sensitive organizations worldwide and is consistent with the actor’s longstanding remit to collect espionage against priority intelligence targets. Although we have only observed Forest Blizzard utilizing their DNS hijacking campaign for information collection, an attacker could use an AiTM position for additional outcomes, such as malware deployment or denial of service.

Mitigation and protection guidance

Microsoft recommends the following mitigation steps to protect against this Forest Blizzard activity:

Protection against DNS hijacking

Protection against AiTM and credential theft

  • Centralize your organization’s identity management into a single platform. If your organization is a hybrid environment, integrate your on-premises directories with your cloud directories. If your organization is using a third-party for identity management, ensure this data is being logged in a SIEM or connected to Microsoft Entra to fully monitor for malicious identity access from a centralized location.
    • The added benefits to centralizing all identity data is to facilitate implementation of Single Sign On (SSO) and provide users with a more seamless authentication process, as well as configure Microsoft Entra’s machine learning models to operate on all identity data, thus learning the difference between legitimate access and malicious access quicker and easier.
    • It is recommended to synchronize all user accounts except administrative and high privileged ones when doing this to maintain a boundary between the on-premises environment and the cloud environment, in case of a breach. 
  • Strictly enforce multifactor authentication (MFA) and apply Conditional Access policies, particularly for privileged and high‑risk accounts, to reduce the impact of credential compromise. Use passwordless solutions like passkeys in addition to implementing MFA.
  • Implement continuous access evaluation and implement a sign-in risk policy to automate response to risky sign-ins. A sign-in risk represents the probability that a given authentication request isn’t authorized by the identity owner. A sign-in risk-based policy can be implemented by adding a sign-in risk condition to Conditional Access policies that evaluates the risk level of a specific user or group. Based on the risk level (high/medium/low), a policy can be configured to block access or force multi-factor authentication. We recommend requiring multi-factor authentication on Medium or above risky sign-ins. 
  • Follow best practices for recovering from systemic identity compromises outlined by Microsoft Incident Response.

Microsoft Defender detection and hunting guidance

Microsoft Defender customers can refer to the following list of applicable detections. Microsoft Defender coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across endpoints, identities, email, apps to provide integrated protection against attacks like the threat discussed in this blog.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint

The following alerts might indicate threat activity associated with this threat. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity and are not monitored in the status cards provided with this report. Microsoft tracks the specific component of Forest Blizzard associated with this activity as Storm-2754.

  • Forest Blizzard Actor activity detected
  • Storm-2754 activity

Entra ID Protection

The following Microsoft Entra ID Protection risk detection informs Entra ID user risk events and can indicate associated threat activity, including unusual user activity consistent with known Forest Blizzard attack patterns identified by Microsoft Threat Intelligence research: 

Hunting

Because initial compromise and DNS modification occur at the router-level, the following hunting recommendations focus on detecting post-compromise behavior.

Modifications to DNS settings

In identified activity, Forest Blizzard’s compromise of an infected SOHO device resulted in the update of the default DNS setting on connected Windows machines.

  • Identifying unusual modifications to DNS settings can be an identifier for malicious DNS hijacking activity.
  • Resetting the DNS settings and addressing vulnerable SOHO devices can resolve this activity, though these actions will not remediate an attacker who has managed to steal user credentials in follow-on AiTM activity.

Post-compromise activity

Forest Blizzard’s post-compromise AiTM activity could enable the actor to operate in the environment as a valid user. Establishing a baseline of normal user activity is important to be able to identify and investigate potentially anomalous actions. For Entra environments, Microsoft Entra ID Protection provides two important reports for daily activity monitoring:

  • Risky sign-in reports surfaces attempted and successful user access activities where the legitimate owner might not have performed the sign-in.
  • Risky user reports surfaces user accounts that might have been compromised, such as a leaked credential that was detected or the user signing in from an unexpected location in the absence of planned travel.

Defenders can surface highly suspicious or successful risky sign-ins using the following advanced hunting query in the Microsoft Defender XDR portal:

AADSignInEventsBeta 
| where RiskLevelAggregated == 100 and (ErrorCode == 0 or ErrorCode == 50140) 
| project Timestamp, Application, LogonType, AccountDisplayName, UserAgent, IPAddress

After stealing credentials, Forest Blizzard could potentially carry out a range of activity against targets as a legitimate user. For Microsoft 365 environments, the ActionType “Search” or “MailItemsAccessed” in the CloudAppEvents table in the Defender XDR portal can provide some information on user search activities, including the Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps connector that surfaces activity unusual for that user.

CloudAppEvents
| where AccountObjectId == " " // limit results to specific suspicious user accounts by adding the user here
| where ActionType has_any ("Search", "MailItemsAccessed")

Threat intelligence reports

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can use the following threat analytics reports in the Defender portal (requires license for at least one Defender XDR product) to get the most up-to-date information about the threat actor, malicious activity, and techniques discussed in this blog. These reports provide the intelligence, protection information, and recommended actions to prevent, mitigate, or respond to associated threats found in customer environments:

Microsoft Security Copilot

Microsoft Security Copilot is embedded in Microsoft Defender and provides security teams with AI-powered capabilities to summarize incidents, analyze files and scripts, summarize identities, use guided responses, and generate device summaries, hunting queries, and incident reports.

Customers can also deploy AI agents, including the following Microsoft Security Copilot agents, to perform security tasks efficiently:

Security Copilot is also available as a standalone experience where customers can perform specific security-related tasks, such as incident investigation, user analysis, and vulnerability impact assessment. In addition, Security Copilot offers developer scenarios that allow customers to build, test, publish, and integrate AI agents and plugins to meet unique security needs.

Learn more

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Blog.

To get notified about new publications and to join discussions on social media, follow us on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), and Bluesky.

To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast.

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]]> Imposter for hire: How fake people can gain very real access http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/12/11/imposter-for-hire-how-fake-people-can-gain-very-real-access/ Thu, 11 Dec 2025 17:00:00 +0000 Fake employees are an emerging cybersecurity threat. Learn how they infiltrate organizations and what steps you can take to protect your business.

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]]> In the latest edition of our Cyberattack Series, we dive into a real-world case of fake employees. Cybercriminals are no longer just breaking into networks—they’re gaining access by posing as legitimate employees. This form of cyberattack involves operatives posing as legitimate remote hires, slipping past human resources checks and onboarding processes to gain trusted access. Once inside, they exploit corporate systems to steal sensitive data, deploy malicious tools, and funnel profits to state-sponsored programs. In this blog, we unpack how this cyberattack unfolded, the tactics employed, and how Microsoft Incident Response—the Detection and Response Team (DART)—swiftly stepped in with forensic insights and actionable guidance. Download the full report to learn more.

Get intelligence-driven response services with Microsoft Incident Response

Insight
Recent Gartner research reveals surveyed employers report they are increasingly concerned about candidate fraud. Gartner predicts that by 2028, one in four candidate profiles worldwide will be fake, with possible security repercussions far beyond simply making “a bad hire.”1

What happened?

What began as a routine onboarding turned into a covert operation. In this case, four compromised user accounts were discovered connecting PiKVM devices to employer-issued workstations—hardware that enables full remote control as if the threat actor were physically present. This allowed unknown third parties to bypass normal access controls and extract sensitive data directly from the network. With support from Microsoft Threat Intelligence, we quickly traced the activity to the North Korean remote IT workforce known as Jasper Sleet.

 
TACTIC
PiKVM devices—low-cost, hardware-based remote access tools—were utilized as egress channels. These devices allowed threat actors to maintain persistent, out-of-band access to systems, bypassing traditional endpoint detection and response (EDR) controls. In one case, an identity linked to Jasper Sleet authenticated into the environment through PiKVM, enabling covert data exfiltration.

DART quickly pivoted from proactive threat hunting to full-scale investigation, leveraging numerous specialized tools and techniques. These included, but were not limited to, Cosmic and Arctic for Azure and Active Directory analysis, Fennec for forensic evidence collection across multiple operating system platforms, and telemetry from Microsoft Entra ID protection and Microsoft Defender solutions for endpoint, identity, and cloud apps. Together, these tools and capabilities helped trace the intrusion, contain the threat, and restore operational integrity.

How did Microsoft respond?

Once the scope of the compromise was clear, DART acted immediately to contain and disrupt the cyberattack. The team disabled compromised accounts, restored affected devices to clean backups, and analyzed Unified Audit Logs—a feature of Microsoft 365 within the Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager portal—to trace the threat actor’s movements. Advanced detection tools, including Microsoft Defender for Identity and Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, were deployed to uncover lateral movement and credential misuse. To blunt the broader campaign, Microsoft also suspended thousands of accounts linked to North Korean IT operatives.

What can customers do to strengthen their defenses?

This cyberthreat is challenging, but it’s not insurmountable. By combining strong security operations center (SOC) practices with insider risk strategies, companies can close the gaps that threat actors exploit. Many organizations start by improving visibility through Microsoft 365 Defender and Unified Audit Log integration and protecting sensitive data with Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention policies. Additionally, Microsoft Purview Insider Risk Management can help organizations identify risky behaviors before they escalate, while strict pre-employment vetting and enforcing the principle of least privilege reduce exposure from the start. Finally, monitor for unapproved IT tools like PiKVM devices and stay informed through the Threat Analytics dashboard in Microsoft Defender. These cybersecurity practices and real-world strategies, paired with proactive alert management, can give your defenders the confidence to detect, disrupt, and prevent similar attacks.

What is the Cyberattack Series?

In our Cyberattack Series, customers discover how DART investigates unique and notable attacks. For each cyberattack story, we share:

  • How the cyberattack happened.
  • How the breach was discovered.
  • Microsoft’s investigation and eviction of the threat actor.
  • Strategies to avoid similar cyberattacks.

DART is made up of highly skilled investigators, researchers, engineers, and analysts who specialize in handling global security incidents. We’re here for customers with dedicated experts to work with you before, during, and after a cybersecurity incident.

Download the full Cyberattack report

Learn more

To learn more about DART capabilities, please visit our website, or reach out to your Microsoft account manager or Premier Support contact. To learn more about the cybersecurity incidents described above, including more insights and information on how to protect your own organization, download the full report.

To learn more about Microsoft Security solutions, visit our website. Bookmark the Security blog to keep up with our expert coverage on security matters. Also, follow us on LinkedIn (Microsoft Security) and X (@MSFTSecurity) for the latest news and updates on cybersecurity.

1AI Fuels Mistrust Between Employers and Job Candidates; Recruiters Worry About Fraud, Candidates Fear Bias

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]]> Harden your identity defense with improved protection, deeper correlation, and richer context http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/10/23/harden-your-identity-defense-with-improved-protection-deeper-correlation-and-richer-context/ Thu, 23 Oct 2025 16:00:00 +0000 Expanded ITDR features—including the new Microsoft Defender for Identity sensor, now generally available—bring improved protection, correlation, and context to help customers modernize their identity defense.

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]]> In today’s digital-first enterprise, identities have become the new corporate security perimeter. Hybrid work and cloud-first strategies have dissolved traditional network boundaries and dramatically increased the complexity of identity fabrics. Security teams are left managing a constellation of users, infrastructure, and tools scattered across hybrid environments or even multivendor ecosystems. To put the threat into perspective, we saw more than 7,000 password attacks every second in 2024, and on average 66% of attack paths involve some type of identity compromise.1 AI is further amplifying this challenge by introducing a surge of non-human identities that require even more unique protection and capabilities.

This evolution demands a fundamental shift in Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR). It’s no longer simply about protecting users; it requires consistent, comprehensive protection for every piece of the identity fabric, whether human or non-human, on-premises or in the cloud, from Microsoft or another vendor.

Deliver seamless ITDR across your identity landscape

ITDR for the modern enterprise

Successful identity security practices understand that seams in protection are the real enemy of identity security. A unified approach between identity and security teams is a necessity  and our unique perspective as both a leading identity and security provider allow us to further streamline the flow of contextual insights, actions, and workflows across these groups, minimizing the potential for gaps or oversight.

A black background with a black square

While both identity and security teams play critical roles in ITDR, it is just one piece of their overall charter and goal. For security operations center (SOC) professionals their core mission remains to prevent, detect, and respond to cyberthreats that could impact their organization’s security and business continuity. On a day-to-day basis, identity and security teams proactively harden their security posture, triage and investigate incoming alerts, and, when a true cyberthreat is confirmed, coordinate a rapid and effective response. Within this broader mission, ITDR resents a critical but focused subset. For instance, identity security posture recommendations are essential but only one piece of broader security hardening.

Similarly, identity alerts offer invaluable insights needed to detect anomalous identity activity, but they must be understood in the context of the overall cyberattack. And while identity response actions such as revoking sessions or enforcing multifactor authentication are critical to stop attacks, they must be coordinated with other response actions across endpoints and other domains to block lateral movement.

True defense requires enriching identity signals and delivering them in context as part of a unified threat picture, enabling coordinated response across domains, and continuously improving posture to stay ahead of evolving cyberthreats.

This blog explores how Microsoft is reimagining identity security to meet these challenges head-on—empowering defenders with the clarity, context, and control they need to stay ahead of identity-based threats.

Enriched and insightful: Building the foundation for identity security

Identity security starts with ensuring your environment is protected as a foundation. Visibility across your organization’s unique fabric of interconnected identities, infrastructure, and applications is what enables SOC teams to detect cyberthreats earlier, respond faster, and reduce risk across the board. Because in today’s identity-driven cyberthreat landscape, partial visibility is no longer an option. To meet this challenge, organizations need sensors for on-premises infrastructure and integrations with cloud-based identity solutions to pull in insights from the entirety of their identity fabric.

Understanding this, Microsoft is proud to offer one of the widest sets of dedicated sensors for on-premises identity infrastructure. Domain controllers, Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS), Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS), and Microsoft Entra ID Connect each serve a distinct purpose within on-premises identity footprint and our dedicated sensors are purpose built to monitor and detect anomalies within their specific activity or configurations.

Additionally, I am excited to announce the general availability of the unified identity and endpoint sensors we unveiled at Microsoft Ignite in 2024. This amazing milestone makes it even easier for new Microsoft Defender for Identity customers to activate identity protections on qualifying domain controllers and start benefiting from identity-specific visibility, posture recommendations, alerts, and automatic attack disruption capabilities within the Defender experience.

A screenshot of a computer

Our protections don’t end on-premises, however. Defender’s native integration with Microsoft Entra ID empowers the SOC with real-time visibility into Entra identity activity, risk level, and seamless integration into Zero Ttrust policies through Conditional Access and user containment. And because identity fabrics are rarely homogenous, Microsoft also supports other cloud identities like Okta, offering unified visibility, posture insights, and ITDR capabilities across platforms.

The raw data into cloud and on-premises accounts is important but to be truly insightful it needs to be enriched. To do this we are shifting the paradigm from account-centric to identity-centric. This means correlating information across accounts, platforms, and environments to reveal an identity’s true footprint. With an understanding of how multiple accounts map back to a single identity, the SOC can more accurately investigate and respond to cyberthreats.

What is privileged access management (PAM)?

Learn more ↗

This enriched view is especially critical when dealing with privileged identities. Integrations with Privileged Access Management (PAM) solutions further empower security organizations to monitor and protect high-value identities.   

All of this is in addition to the native extended detection and response (XDR) correlation done by Microsoft Defender that automatically links identity signals with insights from other security domains, giving security teams a unified threat picture, breaking down silos, and improving response efficiency. From the Identity page in the Defender portal, SOC analysts can see related devices, applications, and alerts—creating a connected view of the threat landscape. These relationships are also exposed in Advanced Hunting, allowing defenders to query across domains and uncover patterns that would otherwise remain hidden. And because Microsoft extends protections to AI agents, service accounts, third-party identities and more, it can use behavioral signals to detect drift and enforce policy—an area where many competitors simply can’t match.

Context is everything

Microsoft Defender delivers deep, enriched visibility into your unique identity fabric. But the true magic lies in how this intelligence is operationalized within the SOC experience. Defender and Microsoft Entra work together generate identity alerts, which get correlated into broader security incidents within Microsoft Defender XDR, giving analysts a unified view of threat activity across endpoints, identities, and cloud resources. Similarly, identity-posture recommendations are part of Microsoft’s Exposure Management strategy, where they are surfaced alongside other risk signals to help teams proactively reduce their attack surface. And when a threat is confirmed, automatic attack disruption can dynamically contain not only the compromised user but also the devices and sessions associated with the attack. This contextualization turns the powerful insights into decisive action. And in today’s threat landscape it’s not just about seeing more—it’s about responding smarter, faster.

A diagram of a network

Getting started

New Defender for Identity customers interested in activating the unified sensor can learn more, including how to deploy, within our documentation here. Existing customers that have already deployed the Defender for Identity sensors do not need to do anything at this time, stay tuned for migration guidance in the coming months.  

Learn more about Microsoft ITDR solutions.

To learn more about Microsoft Security solutions, visit our website. Bookmark the Security blog to keep up with our expert coverage on security matters. Also, follow us on LinkedIn (Microsoft Security) and X (@MSFTSecurity) for the latest news and updates on cybersecurity.

1State of Multicloud Security Risk, Microsoft, 2024.

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]]> Disrupting threats targeting Microsoft Teams http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/10/07/disrupting-threats-targeting-microsoft-teams/ Tue, 07 Oct 2025 17:00:00 +0000 Threat actors seek to abuse Microsoft Teams features and capabilities across the attack chain, underscoring the importance for defenders to proactively monitor, detect, and respond effectively. In this blog, we recommend countermeasures and optimal controls across identity, endpoints, data apps, and network layers to help strengthen protection for enterprise Teams users.

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]]> The extensive collaboration features and global adoption of Microsoft Teams make it a high-value target for both cybercriminals and state-sponsored actors. Threat actors abuse its core capabilities – messaging (chat), calls and meetings, and video-based screen-sharing – at different points along the attack chain. This raises the stakes for defenders to proactively monitor, detect, and respond.

While under Microsoft’s Secure Future Initiative (SFI), default security has been strengthened by design, defenders still need to make the most out of customer-facing security capabilities. Therefore, this blog recommends countermeasures and controls across identity, endpoints, data apps, and network layers to help harden enterprise Teams environments. To frame these defenses, we first examine relevant stages of the attack chain. This guidance complements, but doesn’t repeat, the guidance built into the Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) as outlined in the Teams Security Guide;  we will instead focus on guidance for disrupting adversarial objectives based on the relatively recently observed attempts to exploit Teams infrastructure and capabilities.

Attack chain

Diagram showing the stages of attack and relevant attacker behavior abusing Microsoft Teams features
Figure 1. Attack techniques that abuse Teams along the attack chain

Reconnaissance

Every Teams user account is backed by a Microsoft Entra ID identity. Each team member is an Entra ID object, and a team is a collection of channel objects. Teams may be configured for the cloud or a hybrid environment and supports multi-tenant organizations (MTO) and cross-tenant communication and collaboration. There are anonymous participants, guests, and external access users. From an API perspective, Teams is an object type that can be queried and stored in a local database for reconnaissance by enumerating directory objects, and mapping relationships and privileges. For example, federation tenant configuration indicates whether the tenant allows external communication and can be inferred from the API response queries reflecting the effective tenant federation policy.

While not unique to Teams, there are open-source frameworks that can specifically be leveraged to enumerate less secure users, groups, and tenants in Teams (mostly by repurposing the Microsoft Graph API or gathering DNS), including ROADtools, TeamFiltration, TeamsEnum, and MSFT-Recon-RS. These tools facilitate enumerating teams, members of teams and channels, tenant IDs and enabled domains, as well as permissiveness for communicating with external organizations and other properties, like presence. Presence indicates a user’s current availability and status outside the organization if Privacy mode is not enabled, which could then be exploited if the admin has not disabled external meetings and chat with people and organizations outside the organization (or at least limited it to specified external domains).

Many open-source tools are modular Python packages including reusable libraries and classes that can be directly imported or extended to support custom classes, meaning they are also interoperable with other custom open-source reconnaissance and discovery frameworks designed to identify potential misconfigurations.

Resource development

Microsoft continuously enhances protections against fraudulent Microsoft Entra ID Workforce tenants and the abuse of free tenants and trial subscriptions. As these defenses grow stronger, threat actors are forced to invest significantly more resources in their attempts to impersonate trusted users, demonstrating the effectiveness of our layered security approach. . This includes threat actors trying to compromise weakly configured legitimate tenants, or even actually purchasing legitimate ones if they have confidence they could ultimately profit. It should come as no surprise that if they can build a persona for social engineering, they will take advantage of the same resources as legitimate organizations, including custom domains and branding, especially if it can lend credibility to impersonating internal help desk, admin, or IT support, which could then be used as a convincing pretext to compromise targets through chat messaging and phone calls. Sophisticated threat actors try to use the very same resources used by trustworthy organizations, such as acquiring multiple tenants for staging development or running separate operations across regions, and using everyday Teams features like scheduling private meetings through chat, and audio, video and screen-sharing capabilities for productivity.

Initial access

Tech support scams remain a generally popular pretext for delivery of malicious remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools and information-stealing malware, leading to credential theft, extortion, and ransomware. There are always new variants to bypass security awareness defenses, such as the rise in email bombing to create a sense of stress and urgency to restore normalcy. In 2024, for instance, Storm-1811 impersonated tech support, claiming to be addressing junk email issues that it had initiated. They used RMM tools to deliver the ReedBed malware loader of ransomware payloads and remote command execution. Meanwhile, Midnight Blizard has successfully impersonated security and technical support teams to get targets to verify their identities under the pretext of protecting their accounts by entering authentication codes that complete the authentication flow for breaking into the accounts.

Similarly in May, Sophos identified a 3AM ransomware (believed to be a rebranding of BlackSuit) affiliate adopting techniques from Storm-1811, including flooding employees with unwanted emails followed by voice and video calls on Teams impersonating help desk personnel, claiming they needed remote access to stop the flood of junk emails. The threat actor reportedly spoofed the IT organization’s phone number.

With threat actors leveraging deepfakes, perceived authority helps make this kind of social engineering even more effective. Threat actors seeking to spoof automated workflow notifications and interactions can naturally extend to spoofing legitimate bots and agents as they gain more traction, as threat actors are turning to language models to facilitate their objectives.

Prevalent threat actors associated with ransomware campaigns, including the access broker tracked as Storm-1674 have used sophisticated red teaming tools, like TeamsPhisher, to distribute DarkGate malware and other malicious payloads over Teams. In December 2024, for example, Trend Micro reported an incident in which a threat actor impersonated a client during a Teams call to persuade a target to install AnyDesk. Remote access was reportedly then used also to deploy DarkGate. Threat actors may also just use Teams to gain initial access through drive-by-compromise activity to direct users to malicious websites.

Widely available admin tools, including AADInternals, could be leveraged to deliver malicious links and payloads directly into Teams. Teams branding (like any communications brand asset) makes for effective bait, and has been used by adversary-in-the-middle (AiTM) actors like Storm-00485. Threat actors could place malicious advertisements in search results for a spoofed app like Teams to misdirect users to a download site hosting credential-stealing malware. In July 2025, for instance, Malwarebytes reported observing a malvertising campaign delivering credential-stealing malware through a fake Microsoft Teams for Mac installer.

Whether it is a core app that is part of Teams, an app created by Microsoft, a partner app validated by Microsoft, or a custom app created by your own organization—no matter how secure an app—they could still be spoofed to gain a foothold in a network. And similar to leveraging a trusted brand like Teams, threat actors will also continue to try and take advantage of trusted relationships as well to gain Teams access, whether leveraging an account with access or abusing delegated administrator relationships to reach a target environment.

Persistence

Threat actors employ a variety of persistence techniques to maintain access to target systems—even after defenders attempt to regain control. These methods include abusing shortcuts in the Startup folder to execute malicious tools, or exploiting accessibility features like Sticky Keys (as seen in this ransomware case study). Threat actors could try to create guest users in target tenants or add their own credentials to a Teams account to maintain access.

Part of the reason device code phishing has been used to access target accounts is that it could enable persistent access for as long as the tokens remain valid. In February, Microsoft reported that Storm-2372 had been capturing authentication tokens by exploiting device code authentication flows, partially by masquerading as Microsoft Teams meeting invitations and initiating Teams chats to build rapport, so that when the targets were prompted to authenticate, they would use Storm-2372-generated device codes, enabling Storm-2372 to steal the authenticated sessions from the valid access tokens.

Teams phishing lures themselves can sometimes be a disguised attempt to help threat actors maintain persistence. For example, in July 2025, the financially motivated Storm-0324 most likely relied on TeamsPhisher to send Teams phishing lures to deliver a custom malware JSSloader for the ransomware operator Sangria Tempest to use as an access vector to maintain a foothold.

Execution

Apart from admin accounts, which are an attractive target because they come with elevated privileges, threat actors try and trick everyday Teams users into clicking links or opening files that lead to malicious code execution, just like through email.

Privilege escalation

If threat actors successfully compromise accounts or register actor-controlled devices, they often times  try to change permission groups to escalate privileges. If a threat actor successfully compromises a Teams admin role, this could lead to abuse of the permissions to use the admin tools that belong to that role.

Credential access

With a valid refresh token, actors can impersonate users through Teams APIs. There is no shortage of administrator tools that can be maliciously repurposed, such as AADInternals, to intercept access to tokens with custom phishing flows. Tools like TeamFiltration could be leveraged just like for any other Microsoft 365 service for targeting Teams. If credentials are compromised through password spraying, threat actors use tools like this to request OAuth tokens for Teams and other services. Threat actors continue to try and bypass multifactor authentication (MFA) by repeatedly generating authentication prompts until someone accepts by mistake, and try to compromise MFA by adding alternate phone numbers or intercepting SMS-based codes.

For instance, the financially motivated threat actor Octo Tempest uses aggressive social engineering, including over Teams, to take control of MFA for privileged accounts. They consistently socially engineer help desk personnel, targeting federated identity providers using tools like AADInternals to federate existing domains, or spoof legitimate domains by adding and then federating new domains to forge tokens.

Discovery

To refine targeting, threat actors analyze Teams configuration data from API responses, enumerate Teams apps if they obtain unauthorized access, and search for valuable files and directories by leveraging toolkits for contextualizing potential attack paths. For instance, Void Blizzard has used AzureHound to enumerate a compromised organization’s Microsoft Entra ID configuration and gather details on users, roles, groups, applications, and devices. In a small number of compromises, the threat actor accessed Teams conversations and messages through the web client. AADInternals can also be used to discover Teams group structures and permissions.

The state-sponsored actor Peach Sandstorm has delivered malicious ZIP files through Teams, then used AD Explorer to take snapshots of on-premises Active Directory database and related files.

Lateral movement

A threat actor that manages to obtain Teams admin access (whether directly or indirectly by purchasing an admin account through a rogue online marketplace) could potentially leverage external communication settings and enable trust relationships between organizations to move laterally. In late 2024, in a campaign dubbed VEILdrive by Hunters’ Team AXON, the financially motivated cybercriminal threat actors Sangria Tempest and Storm-1674 used previously compromised accounts to impersonate IT personnel and convince a user in another organization through Teams to accept a chat request and grant access through a remote connection.

Collection

Threat actors often target Teams to try and collect information from it that could help them to accomplish their objectives, such as to discover collaboration channels or high-privileged accounts. They could try to mine Teams for any information perceived as useful in furtherance of their objectives, including pivoting from a compromised account to data accessible to that user from OneDrive or SharePoint. AADInternals can be used to collect sensitive chat data and user profiles. Post-compromise, GraphRunner can leverage the Microsoft Graph API to search all chats and channels and export Teams conversations.

Command and control

Threat actors attempt to deliver malware through file attachments in Teams chats or channels. A cracked version of Brute Ratel C4 (BRc4) includes features to establish C2 channels with platforms like Microsoft Teams by using their communications protocols to send and receive commands and data.

Post-compromise, threat actors can use red teaming tool ConvoC2 to send commands through Microsoft Teams messages using the Adaptive Card framework to embed data in hidden span tags and then exfiltrate using webhooks. But threat actors can also use legitimate remote access tools to try and establish interactive C2 through Teams.

Exfiltration

Threat actors may use Teams messages or shared links to direct data exfiltration to cloud storage under their control. Tools like TeamFiltration include an exfiltration module that rely on a valid access token to then extract recent contacts and download chats and files through OneDrive or SharePoint.

Impact

Threat actors try to use Teams messages to support financial theft through extortion, social engineering, or technical means.

Octo Tempest has used communication apps, including Teams to send taunting and threatening messages to organizations, defenders, and incident response teams as part of extortion and ransomware payment pressure tactics. After gaining control of MFA through social engineering password resets, they sign in to Teams to identify sensitive information supporting their financially motivated operations.

Mitigation and protection guidance

Strengthen identity protection

Harden endpoint security

Secure Teams clients and apps

Implementing some of these recommendations will require Teams Administrator permissions.

Protect sensitive data

Raise awareness

  • Get started using attack simulation training. The Teams attack simulation training is currently in private preview. Build organizational resilience by raising awareness of QR code phishing, deepfakes including voice, and about protecting your organization from tech support and ClickFix scams.
  • Train developers to follow best practices when working with the Microsoft Graph API. Apply these practices when detecting, defending against, and responding to malicious techniques targeting Teams.
  • Learn more about some of the frequent initial access threats impacting SharePoint servers. SharePoint is a front end for Microsoft Teams and an attractive target.

Configure detection and response

  • Verify the auditing status of your organization in Microsoft Purview to make sure you can investigate incidents. In Threat Explorer, Content malware includes files detected by Safe Attachments for Teams, and URL clicks include all user clicks in Teams.
  • Customize how users report malicious messages, and then view and triage them.
    • If user reporting of messages is turned on in the Teams admin center, it also needs to be turned on in the Defender portal. We encourage you to submit user reported Teams messages to Microsoft here.
  • Search the audit log for events in Teams.
    • Refer to the table listing the Microsoft Teams activities logged in the Microsoft 365 audit log. With the Office 365 Management Activity API, you can retrieve information about user, admin, system, and policy actions and events including from Entra activity logs.
  • Familiarize yourself with relevant advanced hunting schema and available tables.
    • Advanced hunting supports guided and advanced modes. You can use the advanced hunting queries in the advanced hunting section to hunt with these tables for Teams-related threats.
    • Several tables covering Teams-related threats are available in preview and populated by Defender for Office 365, including MessageEvents, MessagePostDeliveryEvents, MessageUrlInfo, and UrlClickEvents. These tables provide visibility into ZAP events and URLs in Teams messages, including allowed or blocked URL clicks in Teams clients. You can join these tables with others to gain more comprehensive insight into the progression of the attack chain and end-to-end threat activity.
  • Connect Microsoft 365 to Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps.
    • To hunt for Teams messages without URLs, use the CloudAppEvents table, populated by Defender for Cloud Apps. This table also includes chat monitoring events, meeting and Teams call tracking, and behavioral analytics. To make sure advanced hunting tables are populated by Defender for Cloud Apps data, go to the Defender portal and select Settings > Cloud apps > App connectors. Then, in the Select Microsoft 365 components page, select the Microsoft 365 activities checkbox. Control Microsoft 365 with built-in policies and policy templates to detect and notify you about potential threats.
  • Create Defender for Cloud Apps threat detection policies.
    • Many of the detection types enabled by default apply to Teams and do not require custom policy creation, including sign-ins from geographically distant locations in a short time, access from a country not previously associated with a user, unexpected admin actions, mass downloads, activity from anonymous IP addresses, or from a device flagged as malware-infected by Defender for Endpoint, as well as Oauth app abuse (when app governance is turned on).
    • Defender for Cloud Apps enables you to identify high-risk use and cloud security issues, detect abnormal user behavior, and prevent threats in your sanctioned cloud apps. You can integrate Defender for Cloud Apps with Microsoft Sentinel (preview) or use the supported APIs.
  • Detect and remediate illicit consent grants in Microsoft 365.
  • Discover and enable the Microsoft Sentinel data lake in Defender XDR. Sentinel data lake brings together security logs from data sources like Microsoft Defender and Microsoft Sentinel, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Entra ID, Purview, Intune, Microsoft Resource Graph, firewall and network logs, identity and access logs, DNS, plus sources from hundreds of connectors and solutions, including Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence. Advanced hunting KQL queries can be run directly on the data lake. You can analyze the data using Jupyter notebooks.

Microsoft Defender detections

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can refer to the list of applicable detections below. Microsoft Defender XDR coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across endpoints, identities, email, apps to provide integrated protection against attacks like the threat discussed in this blog.

Customers with provisioned access can also use Microsoft Security Copilot in Microsoft Defender to investigate and respond to incidents, hunt for threats, and protect their organization with relevant threat intelligence.

Microsoft Defender XDR

The following alerts might indicate threat activity associated with this threat.

  • Malicious sign in from a risky IP address
  • Malicious sign in from an unusual user agent
  • Account compromised following a password-spray attack
  • Compromised user account identified in Password Spray activity
  • Successful authentication after password spray attack
  • Password Spray detected via suspicious Teams client (TeamFiltration)

Microsoft Entra ID Protection

Any type of sign-in and user risk detection might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat. An example is listed below. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Impossible travel
  • Anomalous Microsoft Teams login from web client

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint

The following alerts might indicate threat activity associated with this threat.

  • Suspicious module loaded using Microsoft Teams

The following alerts might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity and are not monitored in the status cards provided with this report.

  • Suspicious usage of remote management software

Microsoft Defender for Office 365

The following alerts might indicate threat activity associated with this threat.

  • Malicious link shared in Teams chat
  • User clicked a malicious link in Teams chat

When Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is enabled, the following alert might indicate threat activity associated with this threat.

  • Potentially Malicious IT Support Teams impersonation post mail bombing

The following alerts might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity and are not monitored in the status cards provided with this report.

  • A potentially malicious URL click was detected
  • Possible AiTM phishing attempt

Microsoft Defender for Identity

The following Microsoft Defender for Identity alerts can indicate associated threat activity:

  • Account enumeration reconnaissance
  • Suspicious additions to sensitive groups
  • Account Enumeration reconnaissance (LDAP)

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

The following alerts might indicate threat activity associated with this threat.

  • Consent granted to application with Microsoft Teams permissions
  • Risky user installed a suspicious application in Microsoft Teams
  • Compromised account signed in to Microsoft Teams
  • Microsoft Teams chat initiated by a suspicious external user
  • Suspicious Teams access via Graph API

The following alerts might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity and are not monitored in the status cards provided with this report.

  • Possible mail exfiltration by app

Microsoft Security Copilot

Microsoft Security Copilot customers can use the Copilot in Defender embedded experience to check the impact of this report and get insights based on their environment’s highest exposure level in Threat analytics, Intel profiles, Intel Explorer and Intel projects pages of the Defender portal.

You can also use Copilot in Defender to speed up analysis of suspicious scripts and command lines by inspecting them below the incident graph on an incident page and in the timeline on the Device entity page without using external tools.

Threat intelligence reports

Microsoft customers can use the following reports in Microsoft products to get the most up-to-date information about the threat actor, malicious activity, and techniques discussed in this blog. These reports provide the intelligence, protection information, and recommended actions to prevent, mitigate, or respond to associated threats found in customer environments.

Microsoft Defender XDR threat analytics

Microsoft Security Copilot customers can also use the Microsoft Security Copilot integration in Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence, either in the Security Copilot standalone portal or in the embedded experience in the Microsoft Defender portal to get more information about this threat actor.

Hunting queries

Microsoft Defender XDR

Advanced hunting allows you to view and query all the data sources available within the unified Microsoft Defender portal, which include Microsoft Defender XDR and various Microsoft security services.

After onboarding to the Microsoft Sentinel data lake, auxiliary log tables are no longer available in Microsoft Defender advanced hunting. Instead, you can access them through data lake exploration Kusto Query Language (KQL) queries in the Defender portal. For more information, see KQL queries in the Microsoft Sentinel data lake.

You can design and tweak custom detection rules using the advanced hunting queries and set them to run at regular intervals, generating alerts and taking response actions whenever there are matches. You can also link the generated alert to this report so that it appears in the Related incidents tab in threat analytics. Custom detection rule can automatically take actions on devices, files, users, or emails that are returned by the query. To make sure you’re creating detections that trigger true alerts, take time to review your existing custom detections by following the steps in Manage existing custom detection rules.

Detect potential data exfiltration from Teams

let timeWindow = 1h; 
let messageThreshold = 20; 
let trustedDomains = dynamic(["trustedpartner.com", "anothertrusted.com"]); 
CloudAppEvents 
| where Timestamp > ago(1d) 
| where ActionType == "MessageSent" 
| where Application == "Microsoft Teams" 
| where isnotempty(AccountObjectId)
| where tostring(parse_json(RawEventData).ParticipantInfo.HasForeignTenantUsers) == "true" 
| where tostring(parse_json(RawEventData).CommunicationType) in ("OneOnOne", "GroupChat") 
| extend RecipientDomain = tostring(parse_json(RawEventData).ParticipantInfo.ParticipatingDomains[1])
| where RecipientDomain !in (trustedDomains) 
| extend SenderUPN = tostring(parse_json(RawEventData).UserId)
| summarize MessageCount = count() by bin(Timestamp, timeWindow), SenderUPN, RecipientDomain
| where MessageCount > messageThreshold 
| project Timestamp, MessageCount, SenderUPN, RecipientDomain
| sort by MessageCount desc

Detect mail bombing that sometimes precedes technical support scams on Microsoft Teams

EmailEvents 
   | where Timestamp > ago(1d) 
   | where DetectionMethods contains "Mail bombing" 
   | project Timestamp, NetworkMessageId, SenderFromAddress, Subject, ReportId

Detect malicious Teams content from MessageEvents

MessageEvents 
   | where Timestamp > ago(1d) 
   | where ThreatTypes has "Phish"                
       or ThreatTypes has "Malware"               
       or ThreatTypes has "Spam"                    
   | project Timestamp, SenderDisplayName, SenderEmailAddress, RecipientDetails, IsOwnedThread, ThreadType, IsExternalThread, ReportId

Detect communication with external help desk/support representatives

MessageEvents  
| where Timestamp > ago(5d)  
 | where IsExternalThread == true  
 | where (RecipientDetails contains "help" and RecipientDetails contains "desk")  
	or (RecipientDetails contains "it" and RecipientDetails contains "support")  
	or (RecipientDetails contains "working" and RecipientDetails contains "home")  
	or (SenderDisplayName contains "help" and SenderDisplayName contains "desk")  
	or (SenderDisplayName contains "it" and SenderDisplayName contains "support")  
	or (SenderDisplayName contains "working" and SenderDisplayName contains "home")  
 | project Timestamp, SenderDisplayName, SenderEmailAddress, RecipientDetails, IsOwnedThread, ThreadType

Expand detection of communication with external help desk/support representatives by searching for linked process executions

let portableExecutable  = pack_array("binary.exe", "portable.exe"); 
let timeAgo = ago(30d);
MessageEvents
  | where Timestamp > timeAgo
  | where IsExternalThread == true
  | where (RecipientDetails contains "help" and RecipientDetails contains "desk")
      or (RecipientDetails contains "it" and RecipientDetails contains "support")
      or (RecipientDetails contains "working" and RecipientDetails contains "home")
  | summarize spamEvent = min(Timestamp) by SenderEmailAddress
  | join kind=inner ( 
      DeviceProcessEvents  
      | where Timestamp > timeAgo
      | where FileName in (portableExecutable)
      ) on $left.SenderEmailAddress == $right.InitiatingProcessAccountUpn 
  | where spamEvent < Timestamp

Surface Teams threat activity using Microsoft Security Copilot

Microsoft Security Copilot in Microsoft Defender comes with a query assistant capability in advanced hunting. You can also run the following prompt in Microsoft Security Copilot pane in the Advanced hunting page or by reopening Copilot from the top of the query editor:

Show me recent activity in the last 7 days that matches attack techniques described in the Microsoft Teams technique profile. Include relevant alerts, affected users and devices, and generate advanced hunting queries to investigate further.

Microsoft Sentinel

Possible Teams phishing activity

This query specifically monitors Microsoft Teams for one-on-one chats involving impersonated users (e.g., 'Help Desk', 'Microsoft Security').

let suspiciousUpns = DeviceProcessEvents
    | where DeviceId == "alertedMachine"
    | where isnotempty(InitiatingProcessAccountUpn)
    | project InitiatingProcessAccountUpn;
    CloudAppEvents
    | where Application == "Microsoft Teams"
    | where ActionType == "ChatCreated"
    | where isempty(AccountObjectId)
    | where RawEventData.ParticipantInfo.HasForeignTenantUsers == true
    | where RawEventData.CommunicationType == "OneonOne"
    | where RawEventData.ParticipantInfo.HasGuestUsers == false
    | where RawEventData.ParticipantInfo.HasOtherGuestUsers == false
    | where RawEventData.Members[0].DisplayName in ("Microsoft  Security", "Help Desk", "Help Desk Team", "Help Desk IT", "Microsoft Security", "office")
    | where AccountId has "@"
    | extend TargetUPN = tolower(tostring(RawEventData.Members[1].UPN))
    | where TargetUPN in (suspiciousUpns)

Files uploaded to Teams and access summary

This query identifies files uploaded to Microsoft Teams chat files and their access history, specifically mentioning operations from SharePoint. It allows tracking of potential file collection activity through Teams-related storage.

OfficeActivity 
    | where RecordType =~ "SharePointFileOperation"
    | where Operation =~ "FileUploaded" 
    | where UserId != "app@sharepoint"
    | where SourceRelativeUrl has "Microsoft Teams Chat Files" 
    | join kind= leftouter ( 
       OfficeActivity 
        | where RecordType =~ "SharePointFileOperation"
        | where Operation =~ "FileDownloaded" or Operation =~ "FileAccessed" 
        | where UserId != "app@sharepoint"
        | where SourceRelativeUrl has "Microsoft Teams Chat Files" 
    ) on OfficeObjectId 
    | extend userBag = bag_pack(UserId1, ClientIP1) 
    | summarize make_set(UserId1, 10000), make_bag(userBag, 10000) by TimeGenerated, UserId, OfficeObjectId, SourceFileName 
    | extend NumberUsers = array_length(bag_keys(bag_userBag))
    | project timestamp=TimeGenerated, UserId, FileLocation=OfficeObjectId, FileName=SourceFileName, AccessedBy=bag_userBag, NumberOfUsersAccessed=NumberUsers
    | extend AccountName = tostring(split(UserId, "@")[0]), AccountUPNSuffix = tostring(split(UserId, "@")[1])
    | extend Account_0_Name = AccountName
    | extend Account_0_UPNSuffix = AccountUPNSuffix

References

Learn more

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out ff

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To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast.

The post Disrupting threats targeting Microsoft Teams appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Storm-0501’s evolving techniques lead to cloud-based ransomware http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/08/27/storm-0501s-evolving-techniques-lead-to-cloud-based-ransomware/ Wed, 27 Aug 2025 16:00:00 +0000 Financially motivated threat actor Storm-0501 has continuously evolved their campaigns to achieve sharpened focus on cloud-based tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). While the threat actor has been known for targeting hybrid cloud environments, their primary objective has shifted from deploying on-premises endpoint ransomware to using cloud-based ransomware tactics.

The post Storm-0501’s evolving techniques lead to cloud-based ransomware appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed financially motivated threat actor Storm-0501 continuously evolving their campaigns to achieve sharpened focus on cloud-based tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). While the threat actor has been known for targeting hybrid cloud environments, their primary objective has shifted from deploying on-premises endpoint ransomware to using cloud-based ransomware tactics.

Unlike traditional on-premises ransomware, where the threat actor typically deploys malware to encrypt critical files across endpoints within the compromised network and then negotiates for a decryption key, cloud-based ransomware introduces a fundamental shift. Leveraging cloud-native capabilities, Storm-0501 rapidly exfiltrates large volumes of data, destroys data and backups within the victim environment, and demands ransom—all without relying on traditional malware deployment.

Storm-0501’s targeting is opportunistic. The threat actor initially deployed Sabbath ransomware in an attack against United States school districts in 2021. In November 2023, the actor targeted the healthcare sector. Over the years, the actor switched ransomware payloads multiple times, using Embargo ransomware in 2024 attacks.

In September 2024, we published a blog detailing how Storm-0501 extended its on-premises ransomware operations into hybrid cloud environments. The threat actor gained a foothold by compromising Active Directory environments and then pivoted to Microsoft Entra ID, escalating privileges on hybrid and cloud identities to gain global administrator privileges. The impact phase of these attacks took one of two forms: implanting backdoors in Entra ID tenant configurations using maliciously added federated domains to allow sign-in as nearly any user or deploying on-premises ransomware to encrypt endpoints and servers, eventually demanding ransom for the decryption keys.

Storm-0501 has continued to demonstrate proficiency in moving between on-premises and cloud environments, exemplifying how threat actors adapt as hybrid cloud adoption grows. They hunt for unmanaged devices and security gaps in hybrid cloud environments to evade detection and escalate cloud privileges and, in some cases, traverse tenants in multi-tenant setups to achieve their goals.

In this blog post, we describe the impact of a recent Storm-0501 attack on a compromised cloud environment. We trace how the threat actor achieved cloud-based ransomware impact through cloud privilege escalation, taking advantage of protection and visibility gaps across the compromised environment, and pivoting from on-premises to cloud pivots. Understanding how such attacks are conducted is critical in protecting cloud environments. Below we share protection and mitigation recommendations, including strengthening protections for cloud identities and cloud resources, and detection guidance across Microsoft security solutions to help organizations harden their networks against these attacks.

Overview diagram of the Storm-0501 attack chain from on-premises compromise to cloud-based ransomware
Figure 1. Overview of Storm-0501 cloud-based ransomware attack chain

On-premises compromise and pivot to the cloud

In a recent campaign, Storm-0501 compromised a large enterprise composed of multiple subsidiaries, each operating its own Active Directory domain. These domains are interconnected through domain trust relationships, enabling cross-domain authentication and resource access.

The cloud environment mirrors this complexity. Different subsidiaries maintain separate Microsoft Azure tenants, with varying Microsoft Defender product coverage. Notably, only one tenant had Microsoft Defender for Endpoint deployed, and devices from multiple Active Directory domains were onboarded to this single tenant’s license. This fragmented deployment created visibility gaps across the environment.

Active Directory domains were synchronized to several Entra ID tenants using Entra Connect Sync servers. In some cases, a single domain was synced to more than one tenant, further complicating identity management and monitoring. For clarity, this blog focuses on the two tenants impacted by the attack: one where on-premises activity was observed, and another where cloud-based activity occurred.

Diagram of the Storm-0501 on-premises attack chain that leads to the cloud compromise
Figure 2. Storm-0501 on-premises attack chain

On-premises activity

For the purposes of this blog, we focus our analysis on the post-compromise phase of the on-premises attack, meaning that the threat actor had already achieved domain administrator privileges in the targeted domain. Read our previous blog for a more comprehensive overview of Storm-0501 tactics in on-premises environments.

The limited deployment of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint across the environment significantly hindered detection. Of the multiple compromised domains, only one domain had significant Defender for Endpoint deployment, leaving portions of the network unmonitored. On the few onboarded devices where Storm-0501 activity was observed, we noted that the threat actor conducted reconnaissance before executing malicious actions. Specifically, the threat actor used the following commands:

sc query sense
sc query windefend

The threat actor checked for the presence of Defender for Endpoint services, suggesting a deliberate effort to avoid detection by targeting non-onboarded systems. This highlights the importance of comprehensive endpoint coverage.

Lateral movement was facilitated using Evil-WinRM, a post-exploitation tool that utilizes PowerShell over Windows Remote Management (WinRM) for remote code execution. The abovementioned commands were executed over sessions initiated with the tool, as well as discovery using other common native Windows tools and commands such as quser.exe and net.exe. Earlier in the attack, the threat actor had compromised an Entra Connect Sync server that was not onboarded to Defender for Endpoint. We assess that this server served as a pivot point, with the threat actor establishing a tunnel to move laterally within the network.

The threat actor also performed a DCSync attack, a technique that abuses the Directory Replication Service (DRS) Remote Protocol to simulate the behavior of a domain controller. By impersonating a domain controller, the threat actor could request password hashes for any user in the domain, including privileged accounts. This technique is often used to extract credentials without triggering traditional authentication-based alerts.

Pivot to the cloud

Following the on-premises compromise of the first tenant, the threat actor leveraged the Entra Connect Sync Directory Synchronization Account (DSA) to enumerate users, roles, and Azure resources within the tenant. This reconnaissance was performed using AzureHound, a tool designed to map relationships and permissions in Azure environments and consequently find potential attack paths and escalations.

Shortly thereafter, the threat actor attempted to sign in as several privileged users. These attempts were unsuccessful, blocked by Conditional Access policies and multifactor authentication (MFA) requirements. This suggests that while Storm-0501 had valid credentials, they lacked the necessary second factor or were unable to satisfy policy conditions.

Undeterred, Storm-0501 shifted tactics. Leveraging their foothold in the Active Directory environment, they traversed between Active Directory domains and eventually moved laterally to compromise a second Entra Connect server associated with different Entra ID tenant and Active Directory domain. The threat actor extracted the Directory Synchronization Account to repeat the reconnaissance process, this time targeting identities and resources in the second tenant.

Identity escalation

As a result of the discovery phase where the threat actor leveraged on-premises control to pivot across Active Directory domains and vastly enumerate cloud resources, they gained critical visibility of the organization’s security posture. They then identified a non-human synced identity that was assigned with the Global Administrator role in Microsoft Entra ID on that tenant. Additionally, this account lacked any registered MFA method. This enabled the threat actor to reset the user’s on-premises password, which shortly after was then legitimately synced to the cloud identity of that user using the Entra Connect Sync service. We identified that that password change was conducted by the Entra Connect’s Directory Synchronization Account (DSA), since the Entra Connect Sync service was configured on the most common mode Password-Hash Synchronization (PHS). Consequently, the threat actor was able to authenticate against Entra ID as that user using the new password.

Since no MFA was registered to that user, after successfully authenticating using the newly assigned password, the threat actor was redirected to simply register a new MFA method under their control. From then on, the compromised user had a registered MFA method that enabled the threat actor to meet MFA conditions and comply with the customer’s Conditional Access policies configuration per resource.

To access the Azure portal using the compromised Global Admin account, the threat actor had to bypass one more condition that was enforced by Conditional Access policies for that resource, which require authentication to occur from a Microsoft Entra hybrid joined device. Hybrid joined devices are devices that are joined to both the Active Directory domain and Entra ID. We observed failed authentication attempts coming from company devices that are either domain-joined or Entra-joined devices that did not meet the Conditional Access condition. The threat actor had to move laterally between different devices in the network, until we observed a successful sign-in to the Azure portal with the Global Admin account coming from a server that was hybrid joined.

From the point that the threat actor was able to successfully meet the Conditional Access policies and sign in to the Azure portal as a Global Admin account, Storm-0501 essentially achieved full control over the cloud domain. The threat actor then utilized the highest possible cloud privileges to obtain their goals in the cloud.

Diagram showing the Storm-0501 attack chain in the cloud environment leading to cloud-based ransomware
Figure 3. Storm-0501 cloud identity and cloud environment compromise leading to extortion

Cloud identity compromise: Entra ID

Cloud persistence

Following successful authentication as a Global Admin to the tenant, Storm-0501 immediately established a persistence mechanism. As was seen in the threat actor’s previous activity, Storm-0501 created a backdoor using a maliciously added federated domain, enabling them to sign in as almost any user, according to the ImmutableId user property. The threat actor leveraged the Global Administrator Entra role privileges and the AADInternals tool to register a threat actor-owned Entra ID tenant as a trusted federated domain by the targeted tenant. To establish trust between the two tenants, a threat actor-generated root certificate is provided to the victim tenant, which in turn is used to allow authentication requests coming from the threat actor-owned tenant. The backdoor enabled Storm-0501 to craft security assertion markup language (SAML) tokens applicable to the victim tenant, impersonating users in the victim tenant while assuming the impersonated user’s Microsoft Entra roles.

Cloud compromise: Azure

Azure initial access and privilege escalation

A tenant’s Entra ID and Azure environments are intertwined. And since Storm-0501 gained top-level Entra ID privileges, they could proceed to their final goal, which was to use cloud-based ransomware tactics for monetary gain. To achieve this goal, they had to find the organization’s valuable data stores, and these were residing in the cloud: in Azure.

Because they had compromised a user with the Microsoft Entra Global Administrator role, the only operation they had to do to infiltrate the Azure environment was to elevate their access to Azure resources. They elevated their access to Azure resources by invoking the Microsoft.Authorization/elevateAccess/action operation. By doing so, they gained the User Access Administrator Azure role over all the organization’s Azure subscriptions, including all the valuable data residing inside them.

To freely operate within the environment, the threat actor assigned themselves the Owner Azure role over all the Azure subscriptions available by invoking the Microsoft.Authorization/roleAssignments/write operation.

Discovery

After taking control over the organization’s Azure environment, we assess that the threat actor initiated a comprehensive discovery phase using various techniques, including the usage of the AzureHound tool, where they attempted to locate the organization’s critical assets, including data stores that contained sensitive information, and data store resources that are meant to back up on-premises and cloud endpoint devices. The threat actor managed to map out the Azure environment, including the understanding of existing environment protections, such as Azure policies, resource locks, Azure Storage immutability policies, and more.

Defense evasion

The threat actor then targeted the organization’s Azure Storage accounts. Using the public access features in Azure Storage, Storm-0501 exposed non-remotely accessible accounts to the internet and to their own infrastructure, paving the way for data exfiltration phase. They did this by utilizing the public access features in Azure Storage. To modify the Azure Storage account resources, the threat actor abused the Azure Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/write operation.

Credential access

For Azure Storage accounts that have key access enabled, the threat actor abused their Azure Owner role to access and steal the access keys for them by abusing the Azure Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/listkeys/action operation.

Exfiltration

After exposing the Azure Storage accounts, the threat actor exfiltrated the data in these accounts to their own infrastructure by abusing the AzCopy Command-line tool (CLI).

Impact

In on-premises ransomware, the threat actor typically deploys malware that encrypts crucial files on as many endpoints as possible, then negotiates with the victim for the decryption key. In cloud-based ransomware attacks, cloud features and capabilities give the threat actor the capability to quickly exfiltrate and transmit large amounts of data from the victim environment to their own infrastructure, destroy the data and backup cloud resources in the victim cloud environment, and then demand the ransom.

After completing the exfiltration phase, Storm-0501 initiated the mass-deletion of the Azure resources containing the victim organization data, preventing the victim from taking remediation and mitigation action by restoring the data. They do so by abusing the following Azure operations against multiple Azure resource providers:

  • Microsoft.Compute/snapshots/delete – Deletes Azure Snapshot, a read-only, point-in-time copy of an Azure VM’s disk (VHD), capturing its state and data at a specific moment, that exists independently from the source disk and can be used as a backup or clone of that disk.
  • Microsoft.Compute/restorePointCollections/delete  – Deletes the Azure VM Restore Point, which stores virtual machines (VM) configuration and point-in-time application-consistent snapshots of all the managed disks attached to the VM.
  • Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/delete – Deletes the Azure storage account, which contains and organization’s Azure Storage data objects: blobs, files, queues, and tables. In all of Storm-0501 Azure campaigns we investigated, this is where they mainly focused, deleting as many Azure Storage account resources as possible in the environment.
  • Microsoft.RecoveryServices/Vaults/backupFabrics/protectionContainers/delete – Deletes an Azure recovery services vault protection container. A protection container is a logical grouping of resources (like VMs or workloads) that can be backed up together, within the Recovery Services vault.

During the threat actor’s attempts to mass-delete the data-stores/housing resources, they faced errors and failed to delete some of the resources due to the existing protections in the environment. These protections include Azure resource locks and Azure Storage immutability policies. They then attempted to delete these protections using the following operations:

  • Microsoft.Authorization/locks/delete – Deletes Azure resource locks, which are used to prevent accidental user deletion and modification of Azure subscriptions, resource groups, or resources. The lock overrides any user permission.
  • Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/blobServices/containers/immutabilityPolicies/delete – Deletes Azure storage immutability policies, which protect blob data from being overwritten or deleted.

After successfully deleting multiple Azure resource locks and Azure Storage immutability policies, the threat actor continued the mass deletion of the Azure data stores, successfully erasing resources in various Azure subscriptions. For resources that remained protected by immutability policies, the actor resorted to cloud-based encryption.

To perform cloud-based encryption, Storm-0501 created a new Azure Key Vault and a new Customer-managed key inside the Key Vault, which is meant to be used to encrypt the left Azure Storage accounts using the Azure Encryption scopes feature:

  • Microsoft.KeyVault/vaults/write – Creates or modifies an existing Azure Key Vault. The threat actor creates a new Azure key vault to host the encryption key.
  • Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/encryptionScopes/write – Creates or modifies Azure storage encryption scopes, which manage encryption with a key that is scoped to a container or an individual blob. When you define an encryption scope, you can specify whether the scope is protected with a Microsoft-managed key or with a customer-managed key that is stored in Azure Key Vault.

The threat actor abused the Azure Storage encryption scopes feature and encrypted the Storage blobs in the Azure Storage accounts. This wasn’t sufficient, as the organization could still access the data with the appropriate Azure permissions. In attempt to make the data inaccessible, the actor deletes the key that is used for the encryption. However, it’s important to note that Azure Key vaults and keys that are used for encryption purposes are protected by the Azure Key Vault soft-delete feature, with a default period of 90 days, which allows the user to retrieve the deleted key/vault from deletion, preventing cloud-based encryption for ransomware purposes.

After successfully exfiltrating and destroying the data within the Azure environment, the threat actor initiated the extortion phase, where they contacted the victims using Microsoft Teams using one of the previously compromised users, demanding ransom.

Mitigation and protection guidance

Microsoft recently implemented a change in Microsoft Entra ID that restricts permissions on the Directory Synchronization Accounts (DSA) role in Microsoft Entra Connect Sync and Microsoft Entra Cloud Sync. This change helps prevent threat actors from abusing Directory Synchronization Accounts in attacks to escalate privileges. Additionally, a new version released in May 2025 introduces modern authentication, allowing customers to configure application-based authentication for enhanced security (currently in public preview). It is also important to enable Trusted Platform Module (TPM) on the Entra Connect Sync server to securely store sensitive credentials and cryptographic keys, mitigating Storm-0501’s credential extraction techniques.

The techniques used by threat actors and described in this blog can be mitigated by adopting the following security measures:

Protecting on-premises

  • Turn on tamper protection features to prevent threat actors from stopping security services such as Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, which can help prevent hybrid cloud environment attacks such as Microsoft Entra Connect abuse.
  • Run endpoint detection and response (EDR) in block mode so that Defender for Endpoint can block malicious artifacts, even when your non-Microsoft antivirus does not detect the threat or when Microsoft Defender Antivirus is running in passive mode. EDR in block mode works behind the scenes to remediate malicious artifacts detected post-breach.
  • Turn on investigation and remediation in full automated mode to allow Defender for Endpoint to take immediate action on alerts to help remediate alerts, significantly reducing alert volume.

Protecting cloud identities

  • Secure accounts with credential hygiene: practice the principle of least privilege and audit privileged account activity in your Microsoft Entra ID and Azure environments to slow or stop threat actors.
  • Enable Conditional Access policies – Conditional Access policies are evaluated and enforced every time the user attempts to sign in. Organizations can protect themselves from attacks that leverage stolen credentials by enabling policies such as device compliance or trusted IP address requirements.
    • Set a Conditional Access policy to limit the access of Microsoft Entra ID Directory Synchronization Accounts (DSA) from untrusted IP addresses to all cloud apps.  Please refer to the advanced hunting section and check the relevant query to get those IP addresses.
  • Ensure multifactor authentication (MFA) requirement for all users. Adding more authentication methods, such as the Microsoft Authenticator app or a phone number, increases the level of protection if one factor is compromised.
  • Ensure separate user accounts and mail forwarding for Global Administrator accounts. Global Administrator (and other privileged groups) accounts should be cloud-native accounts with no ties to on-premises Active Directory. See other best practices for using Privileged roles here.
  • Ensure all existing privileged users have an already registered MFA method to protect against malicious MFA registrations
  • Implement Conditional Access authentication strength to require phishing-resistant authentication for employees and external users for critical apps.
  • Refer to Azure Identity Management and access control security best practices for further steps and recommendations to manage, design, and secure your Entra ID environment.
  • Ensure Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps connectors are turned on for your organization to receive alerts on the Microsoft Entra ID Directory Synchronization Account and all other users.
  • Enable protection to prevent by-passing of cloud Microsoft Entra MFA when federated with Microsoft Entra ID. This enhances protection against federated domains attacks.
  • Set the validatingDomains property of federatedTokenValidationPolicy to “all” to block attempts to sign-in to any non-federated domain (like .onmicrosoft.com) with SAML tokens.
  • If only Microsoft Entra ID performs MFA for a federated domain, set federatedIdpMfaBehavior to rejectMfaByFederatedIdp to prevent bypassing MFA CAPs.
  • Turn on Microsoft Entra ID protection to monitor identity-based risks and create risk-based Conditional Access policies to remediate risky sign-ins.

Protecting cloud resources

  • Use solutions like Microsoft Defender for Cloud to protect your cloud resources and assets from malicious activity, both in posture management, and threat detection capabilities.
  • Enable Microsoft Defender for Resource Manager as part of Defender for Cloud to automatically monitor the resource management operations in your organization. Defender for Resource Manager runs advanced security analytics to detect threats and alerts you about suspicious activity.
    • Enabling Defender for Resource Manager allows users to investigate Azure management operations within the Defender XDR, using the advanced hunting experience.
  • Utilize the Azure Monitor activity log to investigate and monitor Azure management events.
  • Utilize Azure policies for Azure Storage to prevent network and security misconfigurations and maximize the protection of business data stored in your storage accounts.
  • Implement Azure Blog Storage security recommendations for enhanced data protection.
  • Utilize the options available for data protection in Azure Storage.
  • Enable immutable storage for Azure Blob Storage to protect from accidental or malicious modification or deletion of blobs or storage accounts.
  • Apply Azure Resource Manager locks to protect from accidental or malicious modifications or deletions of storage accounts.
  • Enable Azure Monitor for Azure Blob Storage to collect, aggregate, and log data to enable recreation of activity trails for investigation purposes when a security incident occurs or network is compromised.
  • Enabled Microsoft Defender for Storage using a built-in Azure policy.
  • After enabling Microsoft Defender for Storage as part of Defender for Cloud, utilize the CloudStorageAggregatedEvents (preview) table in advanced hunting to proactively hunt for storage malicious activity.
  • Enable Azure blob backup to protect from accidental or malicious deletions of blobs or storage accounts.
  • Apply the principle of least privilege when authorizing access to blob data in Azure Storage using Microsoft Entra and RBAC and configure fine-grained Azure Blob Storage access for sensitive data access through Azure ABAC.
  • Use private endpoints for Azure Storage account access to disable public network access for increased security.
  • Avoid using anonymous read access for blob data.
  • Enable purge protection in Azure Key Vaults to prevent immediate, irreversible deletion of vaults and secrets. Use the default retention interval of 90 days.
  • Enable logs in Azure Key Vault and retain them for up to a year to enable recreation of activity trails for investigation purposes when a security incident occurs or network is compromised.
  • Enable Microsoft Azure Backup for virtual machines to protect the data on your Microsoft Azure virtual machines, and to create recovery points that are stored in geo-redundant recovery vaults.

General hygiene recommendations

  • Utilize Microsoft Security Exposure Management, available in the Microsoft Defender portal, with capabilities such as critical asset protection and attack path analysis that enable security teams to proactively reduce exposure and mitigate the impact of Storm-0501 hybrid attack tactics. In this case, each of the critical assets involved – Entra Connect server, users with DCSync permissions, Global Administrators – can be identified by relevant alerts and recommendations.
  • Investigate on-premises and hybrid Microsoft Security Exposure Management attack paths. Security teams can use attack path analysis to trace cross-domain threats that exploit the critical Entra Connect server to pivot into cloud workloads, escalate privileges, and expand their reach. Teams can use the ‘Chokepoint’ view in the attack path dashboard in Microsoft Security Exposure Management to highlight entities appearing in multiple paths.
  • Utilize the Critical asset management capability in Microsoft Security Exposure Management by configuring your own custom queries to pinpoint your organization’s business-critical assets according to your needs, such as business-critical Azure Storage accounts.

Microsoft Defender XDR detections

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can refer to the list of applicable detections below. Microsoft Defender XDR coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across endpoints, identities, email, apps to provide integrated protection against attacks like the threat discussed in this blog.

Customers with provisioned access can also use Microsoft Security Copilot in Microsoft Defender to investigate and respond to incidents, hunt for threats, and protect their organization with relevant threat intelligence.

Tactic Observed activity Microsoft Defender coverage 
Initial access– Suspicious sign-insMicrosoft Defender XDR
– Authentication with compromised credentials
– Compromised user account in a recognized attack pattern
– Malicious sign in from a risky IP address
– Malicious sign in from an IP address associated with recognized attacker infrastructure
– Malicious sign in from recognized attacker infrastructure -Malicious sign-in from an unusual user agent
– Malicious sign-in from known threat actor IP address
– Successful authentication from a malicious IP
– Successful authentication from a suspicious IP
– Successful authentication using compromised credentials
– User compromised through session cookie hijack
– User signed in from a known malicious IP Address
– Suspicious Azure sign-in by user with active session on a device involved in a credential theft attempt

Microsoft Defender for Identity
– Possibly compromised user account signed in
– Possibly compromised service principal account signed in

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps
– Suspicious login from AADInternals tool  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Initial Access’ operation detected (Preview)  
Defender for Storage
– Access from an unusual location to a storage account
– Access from an unusual location to a sensitive blob container
– Access from a known suspicious IP address to a sensitive blob container
– Access from a suspicious IP address
– Unusual unauthenticated public access to a sensitive blob container
Execution – Various types of execution-related suspicious activity by an attacker were observed
– Crafting access tokens and executing actions against the cloud		Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
– Compromised account conducting hands-on-keyboard attack
– Potential human-operated malicious activity
– Suspicious cmdlets launch using AADInternals
Persistence – Federated domain backdoor was addedMicrosoft Defender for Cloud Apps
– Backdoor creation using AADInternals tool  
Privilege escalation– Elevated access to Azure resources
– Assignment of Owner Azure role		Microsoft Defender XDR
– Suspicious Azure elevate access operation by a user with an active session on a device involved in a credential theft attempt
– Possibly compromised Microsoft Entra Connect Sync account elevated its access to Azure resources
– Possibly compromised user elevated access to Azure resources

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious elevate access operation
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Privilege Escalation’ operation detected (Preview)
– Suspicious Azure role assignment detected (Preview)
Defense evasion– Attempts to tamper with Microsoft Defender Antivirus
– Manipulation of Azure Storage account configurations  		Microsoft Defender for Endpoint –
Attempt to turn off Microsoft Defender Antivirus protection

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Defense Evasion’ operation detected (Preview)
Credential access– Entra Connect Sync server compromise and sync accounts extraction
– Extracting credentials from remote machines
– Executing DCSync operation against a domain controller
– Access Azure Storage accounts access keys
– Creation of a key inside an Azure Key Vault for encryption of Azure Storage data		Microsoft Defender Antivirus
– Trojan:Win32/SuspAdSyncAccess.A!EntraConnect
– Backdoor:Win32/AdSyncDump!EntraConnect
– Behavior:Win32/DumpADConnectCreds.A!EntraConnect
– Trojan:Win32/SuspAdSyncAccess.A!EntraConnect
– Behavior:Win32/SuspAdsyncBin.A!EntraConnect  

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
– Entra Connect Sync credentials extraction attempt
– Indication of local security authority secrets theft
– Potential Entra Connect Tampering
– Ongoing hands-on-keyboard attack using Impacket toolkit
– Possible source of DCSync attack  

Microsoft Defender for Identity
– Suspected DCSync attack (replication of directory services)  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps
– Compromised Microsoft Entra ID Cloud Sync account
– AADInternals tool used by a Microsoft Entra Sync account
– Entra Connect Sync account suspicious activity following a suspicious login
– Suspicious sign-in to Microsoft Entra Connect Sync account  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Credential Access’ operation detected (Preview)  
Defender for Key Vault
– Suspicious key vault recovery detected
– Unusual application accessed a key vault
– Unusual operation pattern in a key vault
– Unusual user accessed a key vault
Discovery– Verifying whether Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is onboarded on a machine
– Reconnaissance activity against Active Directory/Entra ID/Azure
– AzureHound tool invocation in the cloud environment		Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
– Suspicious sequence of exploration activities  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps
– Suspicious use of AzureHound  

Microsoft Defender for Identity
– Reconnaissance tool was observed  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– AzureHound tool invocation detected
Lateral movement– Lateral movement between endpoints in the network
– Lateral movement using Evil-WinRM
– Cloud sign-in attempts using stolen credentials or access tokens extracted from compromised endpoints		Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
– Possibly malicious use of proxy or tunneling tool
– Suspicious remote PowerShell execution  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps
– Suspicious login from AADInternals tool  
Exfiltration– Data collection and theft from Azure Storage accountsMicrosoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Data Collection’ operation detected (Preview)  
Defender for Storage
– The access level of a potentially sensitive storage blob container was changed to allow unauthenticated public access
– Publicly accessible storage containers successfully discovered
– Publicly accessible storage containers unsuccessfully scanned
– Unusual amount of data extracted from a storage account
– Unusual deletion in a storage account
– Unusual amount of data extracted from a sensitive blob container
– Unusual number of blobs extracted from a sensitive blob container
– Unusual SAS token was used to access an Azure storage account from a public IP address
– Suspicious external access to an Azure storage account with overly permissive SAS token
– Suspicious external operation to an Azure storage account with overly permissive SAS token
– Access from a suspicious IP address
Impact– Mass Azure data store resources deletion and encryptionMicrosoft Defender XDR
– Suspicious Azure data store resources deletion attempt by a user with an active session on a device involved in a credential theft attempt  

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Defender for Resource Manager
– Suspicious backup resource deletion (Preview)
– Suspicious invocation of a high-risk ‘Impact’ operation detected (Preview)  
Defender for Storage
– Unusual deletion in a storage account

Threat intelligence reports

Microsoft customers can use the following reports in Microsoft products to get the most up-to-date information about the threat actor, malicious activity, and techniques discussed in this blog. These reports provide the intelligence, protection information, and recommended actions to prevent, mitigate, or respond to associated threats found in customer environments.

Microsoft Defender XDR threat analytics

Microsoft Security Copilot customers can also use the Microsoft Security Copilot integration in Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence, either in the Security Copilot standalone portal or in the embedded experience in the Microsoft Defender portal to get more information about this threat actor.

Hunting queries

Microsoft Defender XDR

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can run the following query to find related activity in their networks:

Sign-in activity

Explore sign-in activity from IdentityLogonEvents, look for uncommon behavior, such as sign-ins from newly seen IP addresses or sign-ins to new applications that are non-sync related:

IdentityLogonEvents
| where Timestamp > ago(30d)
| where AccountDisplayName contains "On-Premises Directory Synchronization Service Account"
| extend ApplicationName = tostring(RawEventData.ApplicationName)
| project-reorder Timestamp, AccountDisplayName, AccountObjectId, IPAddress, ActionType, ApplicationName, OSPlatform, DeviceType

The activity of the sync account is typically repetitive, coming from the same IP address to the same application. Any deviation from the natural flow is worth investigating. Cloud applications that are usually accessed by the Microsoft Entra ID sync account are Microsoft Azure Active Directory Connect, Windows Azure Active Directory, and Microsoft Online Syndication Partner Portal.

Cloud activity

Explore the cloud activity (ActionType) of the sync account. Similar to sign-in activity, this account by nature performs a certain set of actions including update User., update Device., and so on. New and uncommon activity from this user might indicate an interactive use of the account, which could legitimate action from someone in the organization or malicious action by the threat actor.

CloudAppEvents
| where Timestamp > ago(30d)
| where AccountDisplayName has "On-Premises Directory Synchronization Service Account"
| extend Workload = RawEventData.Workload
| project-reorder Timestamp, IPAddress, AccountObjectId, ActionType, Application, Workload, DeviceType, OSPlatform, UserAgent, ISP

Pay close attention to action from different DeviceTypes or OSPlatforms, this account automated service is performed from one specific machine, so there shouldn’t be any variety in these fields.

Azure management events

Explore Azure management events by querying the new CloudAuditEvents table in advanced hunting in the Defender portal. The OperationName column indicates the type of control-plane event executed by the user.

let Storm0501Operations = dynamic([
//Microsoft.Authorization
"Microsoft.Authorization/elevateAccess/action",
"Microsoft.Authorization/roleAssignments/write",
"Microsoft.Authorization/locks/delete",
//Microsoft.Storage
"Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/write",
"Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/listkeys/action",
"Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/delete",
"Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/blobServices/containers/immutabilityPolicies/delete",
"Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/encryptionScopes/write",
//Microsoft.Compute
"Microsoft.Compute/snapshots/delete",
"Microsoft.Compute/restorePointCollections/delete",
//Microsoft.RecoveryServices
"Microsoft.RecoveryServices/Vaults/backupFabrics/protectionContainers/delete",
//Microsoft.KeyVault
"Microsoft.KeyVault/vaults/write"
]);
CloudAuditEvents
| where Timestamp > ago(30d)
| where AuditSource == "Azure" and DataSource == "Azure Logs"
| where OperationName in~ (Storm0501Operations)
| extend EventName = RawEventData.eventName
| extend UserId = RawEventData.principalOid, ApplicationId = RawEventData.applicationId
| extend Status = RawEventData.status, SubStatus = RawEventData.subStatus
| extend Claims = parse_json(tostring(RawEventData.claims))
| extend UPN = Claims["http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2005/05/identity/claims/upn"]
| extend AuthMethods = Claims["http://schemas.microsoft.com/claims/authnmethodsreferences"]
| project-reorder ReportId, EventName, Timestamp, UPN, UserId, AuthMethods, IPAddress, OperationName, AzureResourceId, Status, SubStatus, ResourceId, Claims, ApplicationId

Exposure of resources and users

Explore Microsoft Security Exposure Management capabilities by querying the ExposureGraphNodes and ExposureGraphEdges tables in the advanced hunting in the Defender portal. By utilizing these tables, you can identify critical assets, including Azure Storage accounts that contain sensitive data or protected by an immutable storage policy. All predefined criticality rules can be found here: Predefined classifications

ExposureGraphNodes
| where NodeLabel =~ "microsoft.storage/storageaccounts"
// Criticality check
| extend CriticalityInfo = NodeProperties["rawData"]["criticalityLevel"]
| where isnotempty( CriticalityInfo)
| extend CriticalityLevel = CriticalityInfo["criticalityLevel"]
| extend CriticalityLevel = case(
            CriticalityLevel == 0, "Critical",
            CriticalityLevel == 1, "High",
            CriticalityLevel == 2, "Medium",
            CriticalityLevel == 3, "Low", "")
| extend CriticalityRules = CriticalityInfo["ruleNames"]
| extend StorageContainsSensitiveData = CriticalityRules has "Databases with Sensitive Data"
| extend ImmutableStorageLocked = CriticalityRules has "Immutable and Locked Azure Storage"
// Exposure check
| extend ExposureInfo = NodeProperties["rawData"]["exposedToInternet"]
| project-reorder NodeName, NodeId, CriticalityLevel, CriticalityRules, StorageContainsSensitiveData, ImmutableStorageLocked, ExposureInfo

The following query can identify critical users who are mainly assigned with privileged Microsoft Entra roles, including Global Administrator:

ExposureGraphNodes
| where NodeLabel =~ "user"
| extend UserId = NodeProperties["rawData"]["accountObjectId"]
| extend IsActive = NodeProperties["rawData"]["isActive"]
// Criticality check
| extend CriticalityInfo = NodeProperties["rawData"]["criticalityLevel"]
| where isnotempty(CriticalityInfo)
| extend CriticalityLevel = CriticalityInfo["criticalityLevel"]
| extend CriticalityLevel = case(
            CriticalityLevel == 0, "Critical",
            CriticalityLevel == 1, "High",
            CriticalityLevel == 2, "Medium",
            CriticalityLevel == 3, "Low", "")
| extend CriticalityRules = CriticalityInfo["ruleNames"]
| extend GlobalAdministrator = CriticalityRules has "Global Administrator"
| project-reorder NodeName, NodeId, UserId, IsActive, CriticalityLevel, CriticalityRules, GlobalAdministrator

Omri Refaeli, Karam Abu Hanna, and Alon Marom

Learn more

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Blog.

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To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast.

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]]> Modernize your identity defense with Microsoft Identity Threat Detection and Response http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/07/31/modernize-your-identity-defense-with-microsoft-identity-threat-detection-and-response/ Thu, 31 Jul 2025 17:00:00 +0000 Microsoft's Identity Threat Detection and Response solution integrates identity and security operations to provide proactive, real-time protection against sophisticated identity-based cyberthreats.

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]]> In today’s fast-evolving landscape, where businesses balance on-premises systems and cloud resources, identity-based cyberthreats are growing more frequent and sophisticated. The question isn’t whether an identity attack will occur—but when. The numbers are staggering: In 2024 Microsoft saw an average of more than 7,000 password attacks happen per second and a 146% increase in adversary-in-the-middle (AiTM) phishing attacks alone.1

A unified approach to identity threat detection and response (ITDR) is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity. Whether you are an identity admin or a security operations center (SOC) analyst, minimizing your risk starts with eliminating gaps in protection.

Get started with Microsoft Identity Threat Detection and Response

From chaos to control: Uniting identity and security solutions

As the corporate IT landscape has evolved organizations have been left managing complex webs of identities across multiple environments, tools, and vendors, giving cyber criminals many potential gaps to sneak through. The recent Secure Access Report illustrates the direct correlation between complex, multisolution identity vendors and the probability of a significant breach.

Watch the video: Modernize Your Identity Defense with Identity Threat Detection and Response
A screenshot of a business report

According to the report research, companies relying on a patchwork of six or more identity and network solutions not only face operational inefficiencies but also a 79% higher probability of a significant breach.2

At Microsoft, we understand that ITDR is an integrated partnership between identity and access management (IAM) and extended detection and response (XDR) and our vision has been to eliminate the organizational silos and unite these teams, their tools, and processes.

One of the key advantages of our integrated solution is its ability to provide end-to-end visibility and protection. Microsoft Entra natively feeds critical signals to Microsoft Defender and vice versa, enabling comprehensive identity protection across both on-premises, cloud environments, and third parties. Customers like ElringKlinger have recognized that fragmented, siloed security solutions were no longer sufficient to address the sophisticated nature of cyberthreats.

The combination of the individual Microsoft identity solutions is great. It helps us find issues that we might not uncover if we had siloed identity solutions and makes life easier for our team.

—Alexander Maute, Director of IT at ElringKlinger

Proactive protection: Hardening your Identity security posture

ITDR starts long before a cyberattack ever begins, specifically by minimizing your attack surface area. From an identity perspective this means eliminating the vulnerable configurations, stale accounts, and instances of over-privilege that cyberattackers often look to exploit. Microsoft’s approach to ITDR emphasizes this proactive stance: posture management isn’t just a best practice—it’s the foundation that makes real-time ITDR possible. We also understand that successful security practices require coordination across different teams and processes.

Microsoft Entra and Microsoft Defender surface actionable recommendations directly into Microsoft Secure Score and Extended Security Exposure Management (XSPM), enabling security teams to visualize attack paths, prioritize remediation, and proactively harden their defenses before threats materialize. The Identity Security initiative offers an identity-specific view of recommended actions from across on-premises and cloud identities, identity infrastructure, and third-party identity providers. These and other recommendations across endpoints, applications, data, networks, and identities help provide security leaders with unmatched visibility into potential attack paths and vulnerabilities, allowing them to identify and mitigate risks before they escalate.

Milliseconds matter: The power of real-time detection and response

Prevention alone is no longer sufficient in today’s evolving threat landscape—true cyber resilience relies on the ability to detect and respond at speed. In an environment where every second counts, Microsoft’s ITDR approach stands apart by delivering strategically layered defenses that help actively disrupt cyberthreats in real time by unifying the data, tools, and workflows across IAM and SOC teams.

The first layer comes in the form of dynamic, risk-based access controls leveraging the unparalleled insights from the identity landscape. As the identity provider, Microsoft Entra directly manages cloud authentication and enforces protection in real time at the point of authentication. This allows us to dynamically enforce access controls and step-up authentication faster and more consistently than anyone else. This is made possible through the native bi-directional integration between Entra and Defender, which enables continuous, real-time sharing of identity signals across identity and security operations.

What differentiates this approach is the built-in feedback loop: identity signals inform security detections instantly, and threat intelligence from Defender directly influences access decisions in Entra—without manual handoffs, or latency. In addition to adding more potential points of failure, multivendor solutions typically rely on older logs from prior log-on attempts and may not have the full context or see the changes that have happened since then.

Where the integration truly shines, however, is our identity threat response capabilities.  During an active cyberattack, speed of response is critical. That’s why Microsoft has automatic attack disruption, a built-in self-defense capability that uses the correlated native signal in XDR, AI, and latest threat intelligence to identify and contain in-progress attacks like AiTM, ransomware, and more to prevent further lateral movement. Attack disruption maps out the attack path using insights from the unified platform to accurately predict where the attacker will go next. Once a threat is confirmed, Defender initiates automatic containment—isolating compromised assets or shutting down user sessions to prevent further spread.

This near real-time response not only stops the attack but also minimizes its impact, giving security teams critical time to investigate and remediate without disruption to the broader environment. This closed-loop integration strengthens risk engines over time, and responses become smarter and faster, saving time and balancing productivity and security for your identity and SOC teams.

Extending Zero Trust beyond ITDR

ITDR is a critical component of a modern cybersecurity strategy, but it’s only one part of a larger, evolving vision. At Microsoft, Zero Trust is not a checkpoint—it’s a guiding security philosophy that continues to scale and adapt with the evolving threat landscape. Securing the modern organization means adopting a Zero Trust strategy that protects users, data, applications, and infrastructure—regardless of where they reside. This includes enforcing least privileged access, verifying explicitly, and assuming breach as a constant. These principles must extend across the digital estate, not just within identity, but across endpoints, applications, and networks.

Microsoft delivers on this vision through an end-to-end portfolio that supports the full spectrum of Zero Trust capabilities. Microsoft Entra provides robust identity and access management. Microsoft Intune ensures device compliance and health. Microsoft Purview enforces data security and governance. Microsoft Defender offers threat protection across endpoints, identities, software as a service apps, email and collaboration tools, multicloud workloads, and data security insights. And Microsoft’s network access capabilities—delivered through the Entra Suite—secure connections and reduce lateral movement risks. And when you use them together, you can secure any identities, any apps, anywhere.

As organizations navigate increasingly complex environments—from hybrid work to multicloud infrastructures—Microsoft is committed to being a trusted partner on the Zero Trust journey. With Microsoft, organizations are not only prepared for today’s identity threats—they’re equipped for the future of secure digital transformation.

Microsoft Identity Threat Detection and Response

Get comprehensive protection for all of your identities and identity infrastructure. Learn more and explore products.

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The future of ITDR

As threat actors grow more sophisticated, security strategies must evolve beyond fragmented tools and isolated signals. Looking ahead, ITDR will continue to serve as a cornerstone of Zero Trust—one that is natively integrated across identity, apps, endpoints, cloud, network, and beyond. With Microsoft as a trusted partner, business leaders are equipped to go beyond ITDR and protect your identities, secure your operations, and build resilience for the future.

Watch our video to learn more.

Learn more about Microsoft Identity Threat Detection and Response.

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The post Modernize your identity defense with Microsoft Identity Threat Detection and Response appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Jasper Sleet: North Korean remote IT workers’ evolving tactics to infiltrate organizations http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/06/30/jasper-sleet-north-korean-remote-it-workers-evolving-tactics-to-infiltrate-organizations/ Mon, 30 Jun 2025 19:17:49 +0000 Since 2024, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed remote IT workers deployed by North Korea leveraging AI to improve the scale and sophistication of their operations, steal data, and generate revenue for the North Korean government.

The post Jasper Sleet: North Korean remote IT workers’ evolving tactics to infiltrate organizations appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Since 2024, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed remote information technology (IT) workers deployed by North Korea leveraging AI to improve the scale and sophistication of their operations, steal data, and generate revenue for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Among the changes noted in the North Korean remote IT worker tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) include the use of AI tools to replace images in stolen employment and identity documents and enhance North Korean IT worker photos to make them appear more professional. We’ve also observed that they’ve been utilizing voice-changing software.

North Korea has deployed thousands of remote IT workers to assume jobs in software and web development as part of a revenue generation scheme for the North Korean government. These highly skilled workers are most often located in North Korea, China, and Russia, and use tools such as virtual private networks (VPNs) and remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools together with witting accomplices to conceal their locations and identities.

AI as tradecraft

How threat actors operationalize AI ›

Historically, North Korea’s fraudulent remote worker scheme has focused on targeting United States (US) companies in the technology, critical manufacturing, and transportation sectors. However, we’ve observed North Korean remote workers evolving to broaden their scope to target various industries globally that offer technology-related roles. Since 2020, the US government and cybersecurity community have identified thousands of North Korean workers infiltrating companies across various industries.

Organizations can protect themselves from this threat by implementing stricter pre-employment vetting measures and creating policies to block unapproved IT management tools. For example, when evaluating potential employees, employers and recruiters should ensure that the candidates’ social media and professional accounts are unique and verify their contact information and digital footprint. Organizations should also be particularly cautious with staffing company employees, check for consistency in resumes, and use video calls to confirm a worker’s identity.

Microsoft Threat Intelligence tracks North Korean IT remote worker activity as Jasper Sleet (formerly known as Storm-0287). We also track several other North Korean activity clusters that pursue fraudulent employment using similar techniques and tools, including Storm-1877 and Moonstone Sleet. To disrupt this activity and protect our customers, we’ve suspended 3,000 known Microsoft consumer accounts (Outlook/Hotmail) created by North Korean IT workers. We have also implemented several detections to alert our customers of this activity through Microsoft Entra ID Protection and Microsoft Defender XDR as noted at the end of this blog. As with any observed nation-state threat actor activity, Microsoft has directly notified targeted or compromised customers, providing them with important information needed to secure their environments. As we continue to observe more attempts by threat actors to leverage AI, not only do we report on them, but we also have principles in place to take action against them.

This blog provides additional information on the North Korean remote IT worker operations we published previously, including Jasper Sleet’s usual TTPs to secure employment, such as using fraudulent identities and facilitators. We also provide recent observations regarding their use of AI tools. Finally, we share detailed guidance on how to investigate, monitor, and remediate possible North Korean remote IT worker activity, as well as detections and hunting capabilities to surface this threat.

From North Korea to the world: The remote IT workforce

Since at least early 2020, Microsoft has tracked a global operation conducted by North Korea in which skilled IT workers apply for remote job opportunities to generate revenue and support state interests. These workers present themselves as foreign (non-North Korean) or domestic-based teleworkers and use a variety of fraudulent means to bypass employment verification controls.

North Korea’s fraudulent remote worker scheme has since evolved, establishing itself as a well-developed operation that has allowed North Korean remote workers to infiltrate technology-related roles across various industries. In some cases, victim organizations have even reported that remote IT workers were some of their most talented employees. Historically, this operation has focused on applying for IT, software development, and administrator positions in the technology sector. Such positions provide North Korean threat actors access to highly sensitive information to conduct information theft and extortion, among other operations.

North Korean IT workers are a multifaceted threat because not only do they generate revenue for the North Korean regime, which violates international sanctions, they also use their access to steal sensitive intellectual property, source code, or trade secrets. In some cases, these North Korean workers even extort their employer into paying them in exchange for not publicly disclosing the company’s data.

Between 2020 and 2022, the US government found that over 300 US companies in multiple industries, including several Fortune 500 companies, had unknowingly employed these workers, indicating the magnitude of this threat. The workers also attempted to gain access to information at two government agencies. Since then, the cybersecurity community has continued to detect thousands of North Korean workers. On January 3, 2025, the Justice Department released an indictment identifying two North Korean nationals and three facilitators responsible for conducting fraudulent work between 2018 and 2024. The indicted individuals generated a revenue of at least US$866,255 from only ten of the at least 64 infiltrated US companies.

North Korean threat actors are evolving across the threat landscape to incorporate more sophisticated tactics and tools to conduct malicious employment-related activity, including the use of custom and AI-enabled software.

Tactics and techniques

The tactics and techniques employed by North Korean remote IT workers involve a sophisticated ecosystem of crafting fake personas, performing remote work, and securing payments. North Korean IT workers apply for remote roles, in various sectors, at organizations across the globe.

They create, rent, or procure stolen identities that match the geo-location of their target organizations (for example, they would establish a US-based identity to apply for roles at US-based companies), create email accounts and social media profiles, and establish legitimacy through fake portfolios and profiles on developer platforms like GitHub and LinkedIn. Additionally, they leverage AI tools to enhance their operations, including image creation and voice-changing software. Facilitators play a crucial role in validating fraudulent identities and managing logistics, such as forwarding company hardware and creating accounts on freelance job websites. To evade detection, these workers use VPNs, virtual private servers (VPSs), and proxy services as well as RMM tools to connect to a device housed at a facilitator’s laptop farm located in the country of the job.

Diagram of the North Korean IT workers ecosystem depicting the flow of how the workers set up profiles and accounts to apply for remote positions at a victim organization, complete interviews, and perform remote work using applications and laptop farms. The victim organization then pays the workers, who use a facilitator to transfer and launder the money back to North Korea.
Figure 1. The North Korean IT worker ecosystem

Crafting fake personas and profiles

The North Korean remote IT worker fraud scheme begins with the procurement of identities for the workers. These identities, which can be stolen or “rented” from witting individuals, include names, national identification numbers, and dates of birth. The workers might also leverage services that generate fraudulent identities, complete with seemingly legitimate documentation, to fabricate their personas. They then create email accounts and social media pages they use to apply for jobs, often indirectly through staffing or contracting companies. They also apply for freelance opportunities through freelancer sites as an additional avenue for revenue generation. Notably, they often use the same names/profiles repeatedly rather than creating unique personas for each successful infiltration.

Additionally, the North Korean IT workers have used fake profiles on LinkedIn to communicate with recruiters and apply for jobs.

Screenshot of a fake LinkedIn profile from a North Korean IT worker, claiming to be Joshua Desire from California as a Senior Software Engineer.
Figure 2. An example of a North Korean IT worker LinkedIn profile that has since been taken down.

The workers tailor their fake resumes and profiles to match the requirements for specific remote IT positions, thus increasing their chances of getting selected. Over time, we’ve observed these fake resumes and employee documents noticeably improving in quality, now appearing more polished and lacking grammatical errors facilitated by AI.

Establishing digital footprint

After creating their fake personas, the North Korean IT workers then attempt to establish legitimacy by creating digital footprints for these fake personas. They typically leverage communication, networking, and developer platforms, (for example, GitHub) to showcase their supposed portfolio of previous work samples:

Screenshot of a GitHub profile from a North Korean IT worker using the username codegod2222 and claiming to be a full stack engineer with 13 years of experience.
Figure 3. Example profile used by a North Korean IT worker that has since been taken down.

Using AI to improve operations

Microsoft Threat intelligence has observed North Korean remote IT workers leveraging AI to improve the quantity and quality of their operations. For example, in October 2024, we found a public repository containing actual and AI-enhanced images of suspected North Korean IT workers:

Photos of potential North Korean IT workers
Figure 4. Photos of potential North Korean IT workers

The repository also contained the resumes and email accounts used by the said workers, along with the following tools and resources they can use to secure employment and to do their work:

  • VPS and VPN accounts, along with specific VPS IP addresses
  • Playbooks on conducting identity theft and creating and bidding jobs on freelancer websites
  • Wallet information and suspected payments made to facilitators
  • LinkedIn, GitHub, Upwork, TeamViewer, Telegram, and Skype accounts
  • Tracking sheet of work performed, and payments received by the IT workers

Image creation

Based on our review of the repository mentioned previously, North Korean IT workers appear to conduct identity theft and then use AI tools like Faceswap to move their pictures over to the stolen employment and identity documents. The attackers also use these AI tools to take pictures of the workers and move them to more professional looking settings. The workers then use these AI-generated pictures on one or more resumes or profiles when applying for jobs.

Blurred screenshots of North Korean IT workers' resume and profile photos that used AI to modify the images. The individual appears the same in both images though the backgrounds vary as the left depicts an outdoors setting while the right image depicts the individual in an office building.
Figure 5. Use of AI apps to modify photos used for North Korean IT workers’ resumes and profiles
Two screenshots of North Korean IT worker resumes, which use different versions of the same photographed individual seen in Figure 5.
Figure 6. Examples of resumes for North Korean IT workers. These two resumes use different versions of the same photo.

Communications

Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed that North Korean IT workers are also experimenting with other AI technologies such as voice-changing software. While we haven’t observed threat actors using combined AI voice and video products as a tactic first hand, we do recognize that combining these technologies could allow future threat actor campaigns to trick interviewers into thinking they aren’t communicating with a North Korean IT worker. If successful, this tactic could allow the North Korean IT workers to do interviews directly and no longer rely on facilitators standing in for them on interviews or selling them account access.

Facilitators for initial access

North Korean remote IT workers require assistance from a witting facilitator to help find jobs, pass the employment verification process, and once hired, successfully work remotely. We’ve observed Jasper Sleet advertising job opportunities for facilitator roles under the guise of partnering with a remote job candidate to help secure an IT role in a competitive market:

Screenshot of an example job opportunity for a facilitator role, with the headline reading Exciting Job Opportunity A Simple, Secure Way to Land a Tech Job with details regarding the process to interview, provided benefits, and job functions.
Figure 7. Example of a job opportunity for a facilitator role

The IT workers may have the facilitators assist in creating accounts on remote and freelance job websites. They might also ask the facilitator to perform the following tasks as their relationship builds:

  • Create a bank account for the North Korean IT worker, or lend their (the facilitator’s) own account to the worker
  • Purchase mobile phone numbers or SIM cards

During the employment verification process, the witting accomplice helps the North Korean IT workers validate the latter’s fraudulent identities using online background check service providers. The documents submitted by the workers include fake or stolen drivers’ licenses, social security cards, passports, and permanent resident identification cards. Workers train using interview scripts, which include a justification for why the employee must work remotely.

Once hired, the remote workers direct company laptops and hardware to be sent to the address of the accomplice. The accomplice then either runs a laptop farm that provides the laptops with an internet connection at the geo-location of the role or forwards the items internationally. For hardware that remain in the country of the role, the accomplice signs into the computers and installs software that enables the workers to connect remotely. Remote IT workers might also access devices remotely using IP-based KVM devices, like PiKVM or TinyPilot.

Defense evasion and persistence

To conceal their physical location as well as maintain persistence and blend into the target organization’s environment, the workers typically use VPNs (particularly Astrill VPN), VPSs, proxy services, and RMM tools. Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed the persistent use of JumpConnect, TinyPilot, Rust Desk, TeamViewer, AnyViewer, and Anydesk. When an in-person presence or face-to-face meeting is required, for example to confirm banking information or attend a meeting, the workers have been known to pay accomplices to stand in for them. When possible, however, the workers eliminate all face-to-face contact, offering fraudulent excuses for why they are not on camera during video teleconferencing calls or speaking.

Attribution

Microsoft Threat Intelligence uses the name Jasper Sleet (formerly known as Storm-0287) to represent activity associated with North Korean’s remote IT worker program. These workers are primarily focused on revenue generation, use remote access tools, and likely fall under a particular leadership structure in North Korea. We also track several other North Korean activity clusters that pursue fraudulent employment using similar techniques and tools, including Storm-1877 and Moonstone Sleet.

How Microsoft disrupts North Korean remote IT worker operations with machine learning

Microsoft has successfully scaled analyst tradecraft to accelerate the identification and disruption of North Korean IT workers in customer environments by developing a custom machine learning solution. This has been achieved by leveraging Microsoft’s existing threat intelligence and weak signals generated by monitoring for many of the red flags listed in this blog, among others. For example, this solution uses impossible time travel risk detections, most commonly between a Western nation and China or Russia. The machine learning workflow uses these features to surface suspect accounts most likely to be North Korean IT workers for assessment by Microsoft Threat Intelligence analysts.

Once Microsoft Threat Intelligence reviews and confirms that an account is indeed associated with a North Korean IT worker, customers are then notified with a Microsoft Entra ID Protection risk detection warning of a risky sign-in based on Microsoft’s threat intelligence. Microsoft Defender XDR customers also receive the alert Sign-in activity by a suspected North Korean entity in the Microsoft Defender portal.

Defending against North Korean remote IT worker infiltration

Defending against the threats from North Korean remote IT workers involves a threefold strategy:

  • Ensuring a proper vetting approach is in place for freelance workers and vendors
  • Monitoring for anomalous user activity
  • Responding to suspected Jasper Sleet signals in close coordination with your insider risk team

Investigate

How can you identify a North Korean remote IT worker in the hiring process?

To protect your organization against a potential North Korean insider threat, it is important for your organization to prioritize a process for verifying employees to identify potential risks. The following can be used to assess potential employees:

  • Confirm the potential employee has a digital footprint and look for signs of authenticity. This includes a real phone number (not VoIP), a residential address, and social media accounts. Ensure the potential employee’s social media/professional accounts are not highly similar to the accounts of other individuals. In addition, check that the contact phone number listed on the potential employee’s account is unique and not also used by other accounts.
  • Scrutinize resumes and background checks for consistency of names, addresses, and dates. Consider contacting references by phone or video-teleconference rather than email only.
  • Exercise greater scrutiny for employees of staffing companies, since this is the easiest avenue for North Korean workers to infiltrate target companies.
  • Search whether a potential employee is employed at multiple companies using the same persona.
  • Ensure the potential employee is seen on camera during multiple video telecommunication sessions. If the potential employee reports video and/or microphone issues that prohibit participation, this should be considered a red flag.
  • During video verification, request individuals to physically hold driver’s licenses, passports, or identity documents up to camera.
  • Keep records, including recordings of video interviews, of all interactions with potential employees.
  • Require notarized proof of identity.

Monitor

How can your organization prevent falling victim to the North Korean remote IT worker technique?

To prevent the risks associated with North Korean insider threats, it’s vital to monitor for activity typically associated with this fraudulent scheme.

Monitor for identifiable characteristics of North Korean remote workers

Microsoft has identified the following characteristics of a North Korean remote worker. Note that not all the criteria are necessarily required, and further, a positive identification of a remote worker doesn’t guarantee that the worker is North Korean.

  • The employee lists a Chinese phone number on social media accounts that is used by other accounts.
  • The worker’s work-issued laptop authenticates from an IP address of a known North Korean IT worker laptop farm, or from foreign—most commonly Chinese or Russian—IP addresses even though the worker is supposed to have a different work location.
  • The worker is employed at multiple companies using the same persona. Employees of staffing companies require heightened scrutiny, given this is the easiest way for North Korean workers to infiltrate target companies.
  • Once a laptop is issued to the worker, RMM software is immediately downloaded onto it and used in combination with a VPN.
  • The worker has never been seen on camera during a video telecommunication session or is only seen a few times. The worker may also report video and/or microphone issues that prohibit participation from the start.
  • The worker’s online activity doesn’t align with routine co-worker hours, with limited engagement across approved communication platforms.

Monitor for activity associated with Jasper Sleet access

  • If RMM tools are used in your environment, enforce security settings where possible, to implement MFA:
    • If an unapproved installation is discovered, reset passwords for accounts used to install the RMM services. If a system-level account was used to install the software, further investigation may be warranted.
  • Monitor for impossible travel—for example, a supposedly US-based employee signing in from China or Russia.
  • Monitor for use of public VPNs such as Astrill. For example, IP addresses associated with VPNs known to be used by Jasper Sleet can be added to Sentinel watchlists. Or, Microsoft Defender for Identity can integrate with your VPN solution to provide more information about user activity, such as extra detection for abnormal VPN connections.
  • Monitor for signals of insider threats in your environment. Microsoft Purview Insider Risk Management can help identify potentially malicious or inadvertent insider risks.
  • Monitor for consistent user activity outside of typical working hours.

Remediate

What are the next steps if you positively identify a North Korean remote IT worker employed at your company?

Because Jasper Sleet activity follows legitimate job offers and authorized access, Microsoft recommends approaching confirmed or suspected Jasper Sleet intrusions with an insider risk approach using your organization’s insider risk response plan or incident response provider like Microsoft Incident Response. Some steps might include:

  • Restrict response efforts to a small, trusted insider risk working group, trained in operational security (OPSEC) to avoid tipping off subjects and potential collaborators.
  • Rapidly evaluate the subject’s proximity to critical assets, such as:
    • Leadership or sensitive teams
    • Direct reports or vendor staff the subject has influence over
    • Suppliers or vendors
    • People/non-people accounts, production/pre-production environments, shared accounts, security groups, third-party accounts, security groups, distribution groups, data clusters, and more
  • Conduct preliminary link analysis to:
    • Detect relationships with potential collaborators, supporters, or other potential aliases operated by the same actor
    • Identify shared indicators (for example, shared IP addresses, behavioral overlap)
    • Avoid premature action that might alert other Jasper Sleet operators
  • Conduct a risk-based prioritization of efforts, informed by:
    • Placement and access to critical assets (not necessarily where you identified them)Stakeholder insight from potentially impacted business units
    • Business impact considerations of containment (which might support additional collection/analysis) or mitigation (for example, eviction)
  • Conduct open-source intelligence (OSINT) collection and analysis to:
    • Determine if the identity associated with the threat actor is associated with a real person. For example, North Korean IT workers have leveraged stolen identities of real US persons to facilitate their fraud. Conduct OSINT on all available personally identifiable information (PII) provided by the actor (name, date of birth, SSN, home of record, phone number, emergency contact, and others) and determine if these items are linked to additional North Korean actors, and/or real persons’ identities.
    • Gather all known external accounts operated by the alias/persona (for example, LinkedIn, GitHub, freelance working sites, bug bounty programs).
    • Perform analysis on account images using open-source tools such as FaceForensics++ to determine prevalence of AI-generated content. Detection opportunities within video and imagery include: 
      • Temporal consistency issues: Rapid movements cause noticeable artifacts in video deepfakes as the tracking system struggles to maintain accurate landmark positioning. 
      • Occlusion handling: When objects pass over the AI-generated content such as the face, deepfake systems tend to fail at properly reconstructing the partially obscured face.
      • Lighting adaptation: Changes in lighting conditions might reveal inconsistencies in the rendering of the face
      • Audio-visual synchronization: Slight delays between lip movements and speech are detectable under careful observation
        • Exaggerated facial expressions. 
        • Duplicative or improperly placed appendages.
        • Pixelation or tearing at edges of face, eyes, ears, and glasses.
  • Engage counterintelligence or insider risk/threat teams to:
    • Understand tradecraft and likely next steps
    • Gain national-level threat context, if applicable
  • Make incremental, risk-based investigative and response decisions with the support of your insider threat working group and your insider threat stakeholder group; one providing tactical feedback and the other providing risk tolerance feedback.
  • Preserve evidence and document findings.
  • Share lessons learned and increase awareness.
  • Educate employees on the risks associated with insider threats and provide regular security training for employees to recognize and respond to threats, including a section on the unique threat posed by North Korean IT workers.

After an insider risk response to Jasper Sleet, it might be necessary to also conduct a thorough forensic investigation of all systems that the employee had access to for indicators of persistence, such as RMM tools or system/resource modifications.

For additional resources, refer to CISA’s Insider Threat Mitigation Guide. If you suspect your organization is being targeted by nation-state cyber activity, report it to the appropriate national authority. For US-based organizations, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) recommends reporting North Korean remote IT worker activity to the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).

Microsoft Defender XDR detections

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can refer to the list of applicable detections below. Microsoft Defender XDR coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across endpoints, identities, email, apps to provide integrated protection against attacks like the threat discussed in this blog.

Customers with provisioned access can also use Microsoft Security Copilot in Microsoft Defender to investigate and respond to incidents, hunt for threats, and protect their organization with relevant threat intelligence.

Microsoft Defender XDR

Alerts with the following title in the security center can indicate threat activity on your network:

  • Sign-in activity by a suspected North Korean entity

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint

Alerts with the following titles in the security center can indicate Jasper Sleet RMM activity on your network. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Suspicious usage of remote management software
  • Suspicious connection to remote access software

Microsoft Defender for Identity

Alerts with the following titles in the security center can indicate atypical identity access on your network. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Atypical travel
  • Suspicious behavior: Impossible travel activity

Microsoft Entra ID Protection

Microsoft Entra ID Protection risk detections inform Entra ID user risk events and can indicate associated threat activity, including unusual user activity consistent with known patterns identified by Microsoft Threat Intelligence research. Note, however, that these alerts can be also triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Microsoft Entra threat intelligence (sign-in): (RiskEventType: investigationsThreatIntelligence)

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Alerts with the following titles in the security center can indicate atypical identity access on your network. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Impossible travel activity

Microsoft Security Copilot

Security Copilot customers can use the standalone experience to create their own prompts or run the following prebuilt promptbooks to automate incident response or investigation tasks related to this threat:

  • Incident investigation
  • Microsoft User analysis
  • Threat actor profile

Note that some promptbooks require access to plugins for Microsoft products such as Microsoft Defender XDR or Microsoft Sentinel.

Hunting queries

Microsoft Defender XDR

Because organizations might have legitimate and frequent uses for RMM software, we recommend using the Microsoft Defender XDR advanced hunting queries available on GitHub to locate RMM software that hasn’t been endorsed by your organization for further investigation. In some cases, these results might include benign activity from legitimate users. Regardless of use case, all newly installed RMM instances should be scrutinized and investigated.

If any queries have high fidelity for discovering unsanctioned RMM instances in your environment, and don’t detect benign activity, you can create a custom detection rule from the advanced hunting query in the Microsoft Defender portal. 

Microsoft Sentinel

The alert Insider Risk Sensitive Data Access Outside Organizational Geo-locationjoins Azure Information Protection logs (InformationProtectionLogs_CL) with Microsoft Entra ID sign-in logs (SigninLogs) to provide a correlation of sensitive data access by geo-location. Results include:

  • User principal name
  • Label name
  • Activity
  • City
  • State
  • Country/Region
  • Time generated

The recommended configuration is to include (or exclude) sign-in geo-locations (city, state, country and/or region) for trusted organizational locations. There is an option for configuration of correlations against Microsoft Sentinel watchlists. Accessing sensitive data from a new or unauthorized geo-location warrants further review.

References

Acknowledgments

For more information on North Korean remote IT worker operations, we recommend reviewing DTEX’s in-depth analysis in the report Exposing DPRK’s Cyber Syndicate and IT Workforce.

Learn more

Meet the experts behind Microsoft Threat Intelligence, Incident Response, and the Microsoft Security Response Center at our VIP Mixer at Black Hat 2025. Discover how our end-to-end platform can help you strengthen resilience and elevate your security posture.

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Blog. 

To get notified about new publications and to join discussions on social media, follow us on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), and Bluesky. 

To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast. 

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]]> Defending against evolving identity attack techniques http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/05/29/defending-against-evolving-identity-attack-techniques/ Thu, 29 May 2025 17:00:00 +0000 Threat actors continue to develop and leverage various techniques that aim to compromise cloud identities. Despite advancements in protections like multifactor authentication (MFA) and passwordless solutions, social engineering remains a key aspect of phishing attacks. Implementing phishing-resistant solutions, like passkeys, can improve security against these evolving threats.

The post Defending against evolving identity attack techniques appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]>
  1. Pre-compromise techniques for stealing identities
    1. Modern phishing techniques attempt to defeat authentication flows
    2. Lures remain an effective phishing weapon
    3. Phishing risks continue to expand beyond email
  2. Post-compromise identity attacks
    1. AiTM phishing crafted using legitimate company resources
    2. Intra-organization device code phishing
  3. Defending against credential phishing and social engineering

In today’s evolving cyber threat landscape, threat actors are committed to advancing the sophistication of their attacks. The increasing adoption of essential security features like multifactor authentication (MFA), passwordless solutions, and robust email protections has changed many aspects of the phishing landscape, and threat actors are more motivated than ever to acquire credentials—particularly for enterprise cloud environments. Despite these evolutions, social engineering—the technique of convincing or deceiving users into downloading malware, directly divulging credentials, or more—remains a key aspect of phishing attacks.

Implementing phishing-resistant and passwordless solutions, such as passkeys, can help organizations improve their security stance against advanced phishing attacks. Microsoft is dedicated to enhancing protections against phishing attacks and making it more challenging for threat actors to exploit human vulnerabilities. In this blog, I’ll cover techniques that Microsoft has observed threat actors use for phishing and social engineering attacks that aim to compromise cloud identities. I’ll also share what organizations can do to defend themselves against this constant threat.

While the examples in this blog do not represent the full range of phishing and social engineering attacks being leveraged against enterprises today, they demonstrate several efficient techniques of threat actors tracked by Microsoft Threat Intelligence. Understanding these techniques and hardening your organization with the guidance included here will help contribute to a significant part of your defense-in-depth approach.

Pre-compromise techniques for stealing identities

Modern phishing techniques attempt to defeat authentication flows

Adversary-in-the-middle (AiTM)

Today’s authentication methods have changed the phishing landscape. The most prevalent example is the increase in adversary-in-the-middle (AiTM) credential phishing as the adoption of MFA grows. The phish kits available from phishing-as-a-service (PhaaS) platforms has further increased the impact of AiTM threats; the Evilginx phish kit, for example, has been used by multiple threat actors in the past year, from the prolific phishing operator Storm-0485 to the Russian espionage actor Star Blizzard.

TYCOON2FA

How an AiTM phishing kit operated at scale ›

Evilginx is an open-source framework that provides AiTM capabilities by deploying a proxy server between a target user and the website that the user wishes to visit (which the threat actor impersonates). Microsoft tracked Storm-0485 directing targets to Evilginx infrastructure using lures with themes such as payment remittance, shared documents, and fake LinkedIn account verifications, all designed to prompt a quick response from the recipient. Storm-0485 also consistently uses evasion tactics, notably passing initial links through obfuscated Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) URLs to make links harder to identify as malicious.

Screenshot of Storm-0485's fake LinkedIn verify account lure stating Account Action Required with a button reading Verify Account and an alternative LinkedIn URL to copy and paste if the button does not work.
Figure 1. Example of Storm-0485’s fake LinkedIn verify account lure

To protect against AiTM attacks, consider complementing MFA with risk-based Conditional Access policies, available in Microsoft Entra ID Protection, where sign-in requests are evaluated using additional identity-driven signals like IP address location information or device status, among others. These policies use real-time and offline detections to assess the risk level of sign-in attempts and user activities. This dynamic evaluation helps mitigate risks associated with token replay and session hijacking attempts common in AiTM phishing campaigns.

Additionally, consider implementing Zero Trust network security solutions, such as Global Secure Access which provides a unified pane of glass for secure access management of networks, identities, and endpoints.

Device code phishing

Device code phishing is a relatively new technique that has been incorporated by multiple threat actors into their attacks. In device code phishing, threat actors like Storm-2372 exploit the device code authentication flow to capture authentication tokens, which they then use to access target accounts. Storm-1249, a China-based espionage actor, typically uses generic phishing lures—with topics like taxes, civil service, and even book pre-orders—to target high-level officials at organizations of interest. Microsoft has also observed device code phishing being used for post-compromise activity, which are discussed more in the next sections.

At Microsoft, we strongly encourage organizations to block device code flow where possible; if needed, configure Microsoft Entra ID’s device code flow in your Conditional Access policies.

Another modern phishing technique is OAuth consent phishing, where threat actors employ the Open Authorization (OAuth) protocol and send emails with a malicious consent link for a third-party application. Once the target clicks the link and authorizes the application, the threat actor gains access tokens with the requested scopes and refresh tokens for persistent access to the compromised account. In one OAuth consent phishing campaign recently identified by Microsoft, even if a user declines the requested app permissions (by clicking Cancel on the prompt), the user is still sent to the app’s reply URL, and from there redirected to an AiTM domain for a second phishing attempt.

Screenshot of the OAuth app prompt requesting permissions for an unverified Share-File Point Document
Figure 2. OAuth app prompt seeks account permissions

You can prevent employees from providing consent to specific apps or categories of apps that are not approved by your organization by configuring app consent policies to restrict user consent operations. For example, configure policies to allow user consent only to apps requesting low-risk permissions with verified publishers, or apps registered within your tenant.

Device join phishing

Finally, it’s worth highlighting recent device join phishing operations, where threat actors use a phishing link to trick targets into authorizing the domain-join of an actor-controlled device. Since April 2025, Microsoft has observed suspected Russian-linked threat actors using third-party application messages or emails referencing upcoming meeting invitations to deliver a malicious link containing valid authorization code. When clicked, the link returns a token for the Device Registration Service, allowing registration of the threat actor’s device to the tenant. You can harden against this type of phishing attack by requiring authentication strength for device registration in your environment.

Lures remain an effective phishing weapon

While both end users and automated security measures have become more capable at identifying malicious phishing attachments and links, motivated threat actors continue to rely on exploiting human behavior with convincing lures. As these attacks hinge on deceiving users, user training and awareness of commonly identified social engineering techniques are key to defending against them.

Impersonation lures

One of the most effective ways Microsoft has observed threat actors deliver lures is by impersonating people familiar to the target or using malicious infrastructure spoofing legitimate enterprise resources. In the last year, Star Blizzard has shifted from primarily using weaponized document attachments in emails to spear phishing with a malicious link leading to an AiTM page to target the government, non-governmental organizations (NGO), and academic sectors. The threat actor’s highly personalized emails impersonate individuals from whom the target would reasonably expect to receive emails, including known political and diplomatic figures, making the target more likely to be deceived by the phishing attempt.

Screenshot of Star Blizzard's file share spear-phishing email showing a redacted user shared a file with a button to Open the shared PDF. Clicked the Open button displays the embedded link was changed from a legitimate URL to an actor-controlled one.
Figure 3. Star Blizzard file share spear-phishing email

QR codes

We have seen threat actors regularly iterating on the types of lure links incorporated into their attacks to make social engineering more effective. As QR codes have become a ubiquitous feature in communications, threat actors have adopted their use as well. For example, over the past two years, Microsoft has seen multiple actors incorporate QR codes, encoded with links to AiTM phishing pages, into opportunistic tax-themed phishing campaigns.

The threat actor Star Blizzard has even leveraged nonfunctional QR codes as a part of a spear-phishing campaign offering target users an opportunity to join a WhatsApp group: the initial spear-phishing email contained a broken QR code to encourage the targeted users to contact the threat actor. Star Blizzard’s follow-on email included a URL that redirected to a webpage with a legitimate QR code, used by WhatsApp for linking a device to a user’s account, giving the actor access to the user’s WhatsApp account.

Use of AI

Threat actors are increasingly leveraging AI to enhance the quality and volume of phishing lures. As AI tools become more accessible, these actors are using them to craft more convincing and sophisticated lures. In a collaboration with OpenAI, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has seen threat actors such as Emerald Sleet and Crimson Sandstorm interacting with large language models (LLMs) to support social engineering operations. This includes activities such as drafting phishing emails and generating content likely intended for spear-phishing campaigns.

We have also seen suspected use of generative AI to craft messages in a large-scale credential phishing campaign against the hospitality industry, based on the variations of language used across identified samples. The initial email contains a request for information designed to elicit a response from the target and is then followed by a more generic phishing email containing a lure link to an AiTM phishing site.

Screenshot of a suspected AI-generated phishing email claiming to be hiring various services for a wedding.
Figure 4. One of multiple suspected AI-generated phishing email in a widespread phishing campaign

AI helps eliminate the common grammar mistakes and awkward phrasing that once made phishing attempts easier to spot. As a result, today’s phishing lures are more polished and harder for users to detect, increasing the likelihood of successful compromise. This evolution underscores the importance of securing identities in addition to user awareness training.

Phishing risks continue to expand beyond email

Enterprise communication methods have diversified to support distributed workforce and business operations, so phishing has expanded well beyond email messages. Microsoft has seen multiple threat actors abusing enterprise communication applications to deliver phishing messages, and we’ve also observed continued interest by threat actors to leverage non-enterprise applications and social media sites to reach targets.

Teams phishing

Microsoft Threat Intelligence has been closely tracking and responding to the abuse of the Microsoft Teams platform in phishing attacks and has taken action against confirmed malicious tenants by blocking their ability to send messages. The cybercrime access broker Storm-1674, for example, creates fraudulent tenants to create Teams meetings to send chat messages to potential victims using the meeting’s chat functionality; more recently, since November 2024, the threat actor has started compromising tenants and directly calling users over Teams to phish for credentials as well. Businesses can follow our security best practices for Microsoft Teams to further defend against attacks from external tenants.

Leveraging social media

Outside of business-managed applications, employees’ activity on social media sites and third-party communication platforms has widened the digital footprint for phishing attacks. For instance, while the Iranian threat actor Mint Sandstorm primarily uses spear-phishing emails, they have also sent phishing links to targets on social media sites, including Facebook and LinkedIn, to target high-profile individuals in government and politics. Mint Sandstorm, like many threat actors, also customizes and enhances their phishing messages by gathering publicly available information, such as personal email addresses and contacts, of their targets on social media platforms. Global Secure Access (GSA) is one solution that can reduce this type of phishing activity and manage access to social media sites on company-owned devices.

Post-compromise identity attacks

In addition to using phishing techniques for initial access, in some cases threat actors leverage the identity acquired from their first-stage phishing attack to launch subsequent phishing attacks. These follow-on phishing activities enable threat actors to move laterally within an organization, maintain persistence across multiple identities, and potentially acquire access to a more privileged account or to a third-party organization.

You can harden your environment against internal phishing activity by configuring the Microsoft Defender for Office 365 Safe Links policy to apply to internal recipients as well as by educating users to be wary of unsolicited documents and to report suspected phishing messages.

AiTM phishing crafted using legitimate company resources

Storm-0539, a threat actor that persistently targets the retail industry for gift card fraud, uses their initial access to a compromised identity to acquire legitimate emails—such as help desk tickets—that serve as templates for phishing emails. The crafted emails contain links directing users to AiTM phishing pages that mimic the federated identity service provider of the compromised organization. Because the emails resemble the organization’s legitimate messages, lead to convincing AiTM landing pages, and are sent from an internal account, they could be highly convincing. In this way, Storm-0539 moves laterally, seeking an identity with access to key cloud resources.

Intra-organization device code phishing

In addition to their use of device code phishing for initial access, Storm-2372 also leverages this technique in their lateral movement operations. The threat actor uses compromised accounts to send out internal emails with subjects such as “Document to review” and containing a device code authentication phishing payload. Because of the way device code authentication works, the payloads only work for 15 minutes, so Microsoft has seen multiple waves of post-compromise phishing attacks as the threat actor searches for additional credentials.

Screenshot of Storm-2372 lateral movement attempt containing a device code phishing payload
Figure 5. Storm-2372 lateral movement attempt contains device code phishing payload

Defending against credential phishing and social engineering

Defending against phishing attacks begins at the primary gateways: email and other communication platforms. Review our recommended settings for Exchange Online Protection and Microsoft Defender for Office 365, or the equivalent for your email security solution, to ensure your organization has established essential defenses and knows how to monitor and respond to threat activity.

A holistic security posture for phishing must also account for the human aspect of social engineering. Investing in user awareness training and phishing simulations is critical for arming employees with the needed knowledge to defend against tried-and-true social engineering methods. Training can also help when threat actors inevitably refine and improve their techniques. Attack simulation training in Microsoft Defender for Office 365, which also includes simulating phishing messages in Microsoft Teams, is one approach to running realistic attack scenarios in your organization.

Hardening credentials and cloud identities is also necessary to defend against phishing attacks. By implementing the principles of least privilege and Zero Trust, you can significantly slow down determined threat actors who may have been able to gain initial access and buy time for defenders to respond. To get started, follow our steps to configure Microsoft Entra with increased security.

As part of hardening cloud identities, authentication using passwordless solutions like passkeys is essential, and implementing MFA remains a core pillar in identity security. Use the Microsoft Authenticator app for passkeys and MFA, and complement MFA with conditional access policies, where sign-in requests are evaluated using additional identity-driven signals. Conditional access policies can also be scoped to strengthen privileged accounts with phishing resistant MFA. Your passkey and MFA policy can be further secured by only allowing MFA and passkey registrations from trusted locations and devices.

Finally, a Security Service Edge solution like Global Secure Access (GSA) provides identity-focused secure network access. GSA can help to secure access to any app or resource using network, identity, and endpoint access controls.

Among Microsoft Incident Response cases over the past year where we identified the initial access vector, almost a quarter incorporated phishing or social engineering. To achieve phishing resistance and limit the opportunity to exploit human behavior, begin planning for passkey rollouts in your organization today, and  at a minimum, prioritize phishing-resistant MFA for privileged accounts as you evaluate the effect of this security measure on your wider organization. In the meantime, use the other defense-in-depth approaches I’ve recommended in this blog to defend against phishing and social engineering attacks.

Stay vigilant and prioritize your security at every step.

Recommendations

Several recommendations were made throughout this blog to address some of the specific techniques being used by threat actors tracked by Microsoft, along with essential practices for securing identities. Here is a consolidated list for your security team to evaluate.

At Microsoft, we are accelerating security with our work on the Secure by Default framework. Specific Microsoft-managed policies are enabled for every new tenant and raise your security posture with security defaults that provide a baseline of protection for Entra ID and resources like Office 365.

Learn more  

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Blog. 

To get notified about new publications and to join discussions on social media, follow us on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), and Bluesky. 

To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast. 

The post Defending against evolving identity attack techniques appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> New Russia-affiliated actor Void Blizzard targets critical sectors for espionage http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/05/27/new-russia-affiliated-actor-void-blizzard-targets-critical-sectors-for-espionage/ Tue, 27 May 2025 09:45:00 +0000 Microsoft Threat Intelligence has discovered a cluster of worldwide cloud abuse activity conducted by a threat actor we track as Void Blizzard, who we assess with high confidence is Russia-affiliated and has been active since at least April 2024. Void Blizzard’s cyberespionage operations tend to be highly targeted at specific organizations of interest to Russia, including in government, defense, transportation, media, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and healthcare sectors primarily in Europe and North America.

The post New Russia-affiliated actor Void Blizzard targets critical sectors for espionage appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Executive summary:

Void Blizzard is a new threat actor Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed conducting espionage operations primarily targeting organizations that are important to Russian government objectives. These include organizations in government, defense, transportation, media, NGOs, and healthcare, especially in Europe and North America. They often use stolen sign-in details that they likely buy from online marketplaces to gain access to organizations. Once inside, they steal large amounts of emails and files. In April 2025, Microsoft Threat Intelligence observed Void Blizzard begin using more direct methods to steal passwords, such as sending fake emails designed to trick people into giving away their login information.

We thank our partners at Netherlands General Intelligence and Security Service (AIVD) and the Netherlands Defence Intelligence and Security Service (MIVD) for the collaboration on investigating Void Blizzard (also known as LAUNDRY BEAR). You can read their statement here. We also thank our partners at the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for their continued collaboration on investigating Void Blizzard targeting.

Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center has discovered a cluster of worldwide cloud abuse activity conducted by a threat actor we track as Void Blizzard (LAUNDRY BEAR), who we assess with high confidence is Russia-affiliated and has been active since at least April 2024. While Void Blizzard has a global reach, their cyberespionage activity disproportionately targets NATO member states and Ukraine, indicating that the actor is likely collecting intelligence to help support Russian strategic objectives. In particular, the threat actor’s prolific activity against networks in critical sectors poses a heightened risk to NATO member states and allies to Ukraine in general.

Void Blizzard’s cyberespionage operations tend to be highly targeted at specific organizations of interest to the Russian government, including in government, defense, transportation, media, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and healthcare sectors primarily in Europe and North America. The threat actor uses stolen credentials—which are likely procured from commodity infostealer ecosystems—and collects a high volume of email and files from compromised organizations.

In April 2025, Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center observed Void Blizzard evolving their initial access techniques to include targeted spear phishing for credential theft. While Void Blizzard’s tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) are not unique among advanced persistent threat actors or even Russian nation state-sponsored groups, the widespread success of their operations underscores the enduring threat from even unsophisticated TTPs when leveraged by determined actors seeking to collect sensitive information.

In this report, we share our analysis of Void Blizzard’s targeting and TTPs, with the goal of enabling the broader community to apply specific detections and mitigation guidance to disrupt and protect against Void Blizzard’s operations. We extend our gratitude to our partners at the Netherlands General Intelligence and Security Service (AIVD), the Netherlands Defence Intelligence and Security Service (MIVD), and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for their collaboration in investigating and raising awareness on Void Blizzard activity and tooling to help organizations disrupt and defend against this threat actor.

Void Blizzard targets

Void Blizzard primarily targets NATO member states and Ukraine. Many of the compromised organizations overlap with past—or, in some cases, concurrent—targeting by other well-known Russian state actors, including Forest Blizzard, Midnight Blizzard, and Secret Blizzard. This intersection suggests shared espionage and intelligence collection interests assigned to the parent organizations of these threat actors. Since mid-2024, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed Void Blizzard targeting the following industry verticals, many resulting in successful compromises:

  • Communications/Telecommunications
  • Defense Industrial Base
  • Healthcare
  • Education
  • Government agencies and services
  • Information technology
  • Intergovernmental organizations
  • Media
  • NGOs
  • Transportation

Void Blizzard regularly targets government organizations and law enforcement agencies, particularly in NATO member states and especially in countries that provide direct military or humanitarian support to Ukraine. Within Ukraine, Void Blizzard has successfully compromised organizations in multiple sectors, including education, transportation, and defense. In October 2024, Void Blizzard compromised several user accounts at a Ukrainian aviation organization that had been previously targeted by Russian General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) actor Seashell Blizzard in 2022. This targeting overlap reflects Russia’s long-standing interest in this organization and, more broadly, in aviation-related organizations since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In 2023, another GRU actor, Forest Blizzard, targeted a prominent aviation organization in Ukraine, and since at least August 2024, it has conducted increasing password spray attacks against several NATO member states’ air traffic control providers.

Tools, tactics, and procedures

Initial access

Void Blizzard conducts opportunistic yet targeted high-volume cyberoperations against targets of intelligence value to the Russian government. Their operations predominately leverage unsophisticated techniques for initial access such as password spray and using stolen authentication credentials. Microsoft assesses that Void Blizzard procures cookies and other credentials through criminal ecosystems. These credentials are then used to gain access to Exchange and sometimes SharePoint Online for information collection.

In April 2025, we identified a Void Blizzard adversary-in-the-middle (AitM) spear phishing campaign that targeted over 20 NGO sector organizations in Europe and the United States. The threat actor used a typosquatted domain to spoof the Microsoft Entra authentication portal. Use of a typosquatted domain to spoof Microsoft Entra authentication was a newly observed initial access tactic for this threat actor. This new tactic suggests that Void Blizzard is augmenting their opportunistic but focused access operations with a more targeted approach, increasing the risk for organizations in critical sectors.

In this campaign, the threat actor posed as an organizer from the European Defense and Security Summit and sent emails containing messages with a PDF attachment that lured targets with a fake invitation to the Summit.

A large ship in the water
Figure 1. Phishing email body

The attachment contained a malicious QR code that redirected to Void Blizzard infrastructure micsrosoftonline[.]com, which hosts a credential phishing page spoofing the Microsoft Entra authentication page. We assess that Void Blizzard is using the open-source attack framework Evilginx to conduct the AitM phishing campaign and steal authentication data, including the input username and password and any cookies generated by the server. Evilginx, publicly released in 2017, was the first widely available phishing kit with AitM capabilities.

Screenshot of the malicious PDF attachment with malicious QR code
Figure 2. PDF attachment with malicious QR code
A screenshot of a computer screen
Figure 3. Credential phishing page on actor infrastructure

Post-compromise activity

Despite the lack of sophistication in their initial access methods, Void Blizzard has been effective in gaining access to and collecting information from compromised organizations in critical sectors.

After gaining initial access, Void Blizzard abuses legitimate cloud APIs, such as Exchange Online and Microsoft Graph, to enumerate users’ mailboxes, including any shared mailboxes, and cloud-hosted files. Once accounts are successfully compromised, the actor likely automates the bulk collection of cloud-hosted data (primarily email and files) and any mailboxes or file shares that the compromised user can access, which can include mailboxes and folders belonging to other users who have granted other users read permissions.

In a small number of Void Blizzard compromises, Microsoft Threat Intelligence has also observed the threat actor accessing Microsoft Teams conversations and messages via the Microsoft Teams web client application. The threat actor has also in some cases enumerated the compromised organization’s Microsoft Entra ID configuration using the publicly available AzureHound tool to gain information about the users, roles, groups, applications, and devices belonging to that tenant.

Mitigation and protection guidance

Microsoft Threat Intelligence recommends organizations that are most likely at risk, primarily those in critical sectors including government and defense, to implement the following recommendations to mitigate against Void Blizzard activity:

Hardening identity and authentication

  • Implement a sign-in risk policy to automate response to risky sign-ins. A sign-in risk represents the probability that a given authentication request isn’t authorized by the identity owner. A sign-in risk-based policy can be implemented by adding a sign-in risk condition to Conditional Access policies that evaluate the risk level of a specific user or group. Based on the risk level (high/medium/low), a policy can be configured to block access or force multi-factor authentication.
    • When a user is a high risk and Conditional access evaluation is enabled, the user’s access is revoked, and they are forced to re-authenticate.
    • For regular activity monitoring, use Risky sign-in reports, which surface attempted and successful user access activities where the legitimate owner might not have performed the sign-in.
  • Require multifactor authentication (MFA). While certain attacks attempt to circumvent MFA, implementation of MFA remains an essential pillar in identity security and is highly effective at stopping a variety of threats.
  • Centralize your organization’s identity management into a single platform. If your organization is a hybrid environment, integrate your on-premises directories with your cloud directories. If your organization is using a third-party for identity management, ensure this data is being logged in a SIEM or connected to Microsoft Entra to fully monitor for malicious identity access from a centralized location. The added benefits to centralizing all identity data is to facilitate implementation of Single Sign On (SSO) and provide users with a more seamless authentication process, as well as configure Microsoft Entra ID’s machine learning models to operate on all identity data, thus learning the difference between legitimate access and malicious access quicker and easier. It is recommended to synchronize all user accounts except administrative and high privileged ones when doing this to maintain a boundary between the on-premises environment and the cloud environment, in case of a breach.
  • Secure accounts with credential hygiene: practice the principle of least privilege and audit privileged account activity in your Entra ID environments to slow and stop attackers.

Hardening email security

  • Manage mailbox auditing to ensure actions performed by mailbox owners, delegates, and admins are automatically logged. New mailboxes should already have this feature turned on by default.
  • Run a non-owner mailbox access report in the Exchange Admin Center to detect unauthorized access onto a mailbox.

Hardening against post-compromise activity

  • If a breach or compromise via commodity info stealer is suspected, ensure that any accounts that may have been accessed by that machine have their credentials rotated in addition to removing the malware. Given the widespread use of infostealers in attacks, organizations should immediately respond to infostealer activity and mitigate the risk of credential theft to prevent follow-on malicious activity.
  • Conduct an audit search in the Microsoft Graph API for anomalous activity.
  • Create Defender for Cloud Apps anomaly detection policies.
  • Prevent, detect or investigate possible token theft activity by reviewing mitigation techniques.
  • If you suspect password spray activity against your organization’s networks, you can refer to this guide for password spray investigation.

Microsoft Defender XDR detections

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can refer to the list of applicable detections below. Microsoft Defender XDR coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across endpoints, identities, email, apps to provide integrated protection against attacks like the threat discussed in this blog.

Customers with provisioned access can also use Microsoft Security Copilot in Microsoft Defender to investigate and respond to incidents, hunt for threats, and protect their organization with relevant threat intelligence.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint

The following alert indicates threat actor activity related to Void Blizzard. Note, however, that this alert can be also triggered by Void Blizzard activity that is not related to the activity covered in this report.

  • Void Blizzard activity

The following alerts might indicate credential theft activity related to Void Blizzard utilizing commodity information stealers or conducting password spraying techniques. Note, however, that these alerts can be also triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Information stealing malware activity
  • Password spraying

Microsoft Defender for Identity

The following Microsoft Defender for Identity alerts can indicate associated threat activity. Note, however, that these alerts can be also triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Password Spray
  • Unfamiliar Sign-in properties
  • Atypical travel
  • Suspicious behavior: Impossible travel activity

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

The following Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps alerts can indicate associated threat activity. Note, however, that these alerts can be also triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Impossible travel
  • Activity from suspicious IP addresses
  • Unusual activities (by user)

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

The following alerts might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat. These alerts, however, can be triggered by unrelated threat activity and are not monitored in the status cards provided with this report.

  • AzureHound tool invocation detected
  • Communication with possible phishing domain
  • Communication with suspicious domain identified by threat intelligence

Microsoft Entra ID Protection

The following Microsoft Entra ID Protection risk detections inform Entra ID user risk events and can indicate associated threat activity, including unusual user activity consistent with known attack patterns identified by Microsoft Threat Intelligence research. Note, however, that these alerts can be also triggered by unrelated threat activity.

  • Anomalous Token (sign-in) (RiskEventType: anomalousToken)
  • Password spray (RiskEventType: passwordSpray)
  • Anomalous Token (user) (RiskEventType: anomalousToken)
  • Attacker in the Middle (RiskEventType: attackerinTheMiddle)
  • Activity from Anonymous IP address (RiskEventType: anonymizedIPAddress)
  • Microsoft Entra threat intelligence (sign-in): (RiskEventType: investigationsThreatIntelligence)
  • Suspicious API Traffic (RiskEventType: suspiciousAPITraffic)

Microsoft Security Copilot

Security Copilot customers can use the standalone experience to create their own prompts or run the following pre-built promptbooks to automate incident response or investigation tasks related to this threat:

  • Incident investigation
  • Microsoft User analysis
  • Threat actor profile
  • Threat Intelligence 360 report based on MDTI article
  • Vulnerability impact assessment

Note that some promptbooks require access to plugins for Microsoft products such as Microsoft Defender XDR or Microsoft Sentinel.

Threat intelligence reports

Microsoft customers can use the following reports in Microsoft products to get the most up-to-date information about the threat actor, malicious activity, and techniques discussed in this blog. These reports provide the intelligence, protection information, and recommended actions to prevent, mitigate, or respond to associated threats found in customer environments.

Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence

  • Void Blizzard

Microsoft Security Copilot customers can also use the Microsoft Security Copilot integration in Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence, either in the Security Copilot standalone portal or in the embedded experience in the Microsoft Defender portal to get more information about this threat actor.

Hunting queries

Microsoft Defender XDR

Microsoft Defender XDR customers can find related Void Blizzard spear phishing activity related to this threat in their networks by running the following queries.

Possible phishing email targets

The following query can help identify possible email targets of Void Blizzard’s spear phishing attempts

EmailEvents
| where SenderFromDomain in~ ("ebsumrnit.eu")
| project SenderFromDomain, SenderFromAddress, RecipientEmailAddress, Subject, Timestamp

Communication with Void Blizzard domain

The following query can help surface devices that might have communicated with Void Blizzard’s spear phishing domain:

let domainList = dynamic(["micsrosoftonline.com", "outlook-office.micsrosoftonline.com"]);
union
(
    DnsEvents
    | where QueryType has_any(domainList) or Name has_any(domainList)
    | project TimeGenerated, Domain = QueryType, SourceTable = "DnsEvents"
),
(
    IdentityQueryEvents
    | where QueryTarget has_any(domainList)
    | project Timestamp, Domain = QueryTarget, SourceTable = "IdentityQueryEvents"
),
(
    DeviceNetworkEvents
    | where RemoteUrl has_any(domainList)
    | project Timestamp, Domain = RemoteUrl, SourceTable = "DeviceNetworkEvents"
),
(
    DeviceNetworkInfo
    | extend DnsAddresses = parse_json(DnsAddresses), ConnectedNetworks = parse_json(ConnectedNetworks)
    | mv-expand DnsAddresses, ConnectedNetworks
    | where DnsAddresses has_any(domainList) or ConnectedNetworks.Name has_any(domainList)
    | project Timestamp, Domain = coalesce(DnsAddresses, ConnectedNetworks.Name), SourceTable = "DeviceNetworkInfo"
),
(
    VMConnection
    | extend RemoteDnsQuestions = parse_json(RemoteDnsQuestions), RemoteDnsCanonicalNames = parse_json(RemoteDnsCanonicalNames)
    | mv-expand RemoteDnsQuestions, RemoteDnsCanonicalNames
    | where RemoteDnsQuestions has_any(domainList) or RemoteDnsCanonicalNames has_any(domainList)
    | project TimeGenerated, Domain = coalesce(RemoteDnsQuestions, RemoteDnsCanonicalNames), SourceTable = "VMConnection"
),
(
    W3CIISLog
    | where csHost has_any(domainList) or csReferer has_any(domainList)
    | project TimeGenerated, Domain = coalesce(csHost, csReferer), SourceTable = "W3CIISLog"
),
(
    EmailUrlInfo
    | where UrlDomain has_any(domainList)
    | project Timestamp, Domain = UrlDomain, SourceTable = "EmailUrlInfo"
),
(
    UrlClickEvents
    | where Url has_any(domainList)
    | project Timestamp, Domain = Url, SourceTable = "UrlClickEvents"
)
| order by TimeGenerated desc

Microsoft Sentinel

The Microsoft blog Web Shell Threat Hunting with Azure Sentinel provides hunting queries and techniques for Sentinel-specific threat hunting. Several hunting queries are also available below. 

NOTE: Microsoft Sentinel customers can use the following queries to detect phishing attempts and email exfiltration attempts via Graph API. While these queries are not specific to threat actors, they can help you stay vigilant and safeguard your organization from phishing attacks. These queries search for a week’s worth of events. To explore up to 30 days’ worth of raw data to inspect events in your network and locate potentially related indicators for more than a week, go to the Advanced hunting page > Query tab, select the calendar dropdown menu to update your query to hunt for the Last 30 days.

If a query provides high value insights into possible malicious or otherwise anomalous behavior, you can create a custom detection rule based on that query and surface those insights as custom alerts. To do this in the Defender XDR portal, run the query in the Advanced hunting page and select Create detection rule. To do this in the Sentinel portal, use hunting capabilities to run and view the query’s results, then select New alert rule > Create Microsoft Sentinel alert.

Campaign with suspicious keywords

In this detection, we track emails with suspicious keywords in subjects.

let PhishingKeywords = ()
  {pack_array("account", "alert", "bank", "billing", "card", "change", "confirmation","login", "password", "mfa", "authorize", "authenticate", "payment", "urgent", "verify", "blocked");};
  EmailEvents
  | where Timestamp > ago(1d)
  | where EmailDirection == "Inbound"
  | where DeliveryAction == "Delivered"
  | where isempty(SenderObjectId)
  | where Subject has_any (PhishingKeywords())

Determine successfully delivered phishing emails to Inbox/Junk folder

This query identifies threats which got successfully delivered to Inbox/Junk folder.

EmailEvents
  | where isnotempty(ThreatTypes) and DeliveryLocation in~ ("Inbox/folder","Junk folder")
  | extend Name = tostring(split(SenderFromAddress, '@', 0)[0]), UPNSuffix = tostring(split(SenderFromAddress, '@', 1)[0])
  | extend Account_0_Name = Name
  | extend Account_0_UPNSuffix = UPNSuffix
  | extend IP_0_Address = SenderIPv4
  | extend MailBox_0_MailboxPrimaryAddress = RecipientEmailAddress

Successful sign-in from phishing link

This content is employed to correlate with Microsoft Defender XDR phishing-related alerts. It focuses on instances where a user successfully connects to a phishing URL from a non-Microsoft network device and subsequently makes successful sign-in attempts from the phishing IP address.

let Alert_List= dynamic([
    "Phishing link click observed in Network Traffic",
    "Phish delivered due to an IP allow policy",
    "A potentially malicious URL click was detected",
    "High Risk Sign-in Observed in Network Traffic",
    "A user clicked through to a potentially malicious URL",
    "Suspicious network connection to AitM phishing site",
    "Messages containing malicious entity not removed after delivery",
    "Email messages containing malicious URL removed after delivery",
    "Email reported by user as malware or phish",
    "Phish delivered due to an ETR override",
    "Phish not zapped because ZAP is disabled"]);
    SecurityAlert
    | where AlertName in~ (Alert_List)
    //Findling Alerts which has the URL
    | where Entities has "url"
    //extracting Entities
    | extend Entities = parse_json(Entities)
    | mv-apply Entity = Entities on
        (
        where Entity.Type == 'url'
        | extend EntityUrl = tostring(Entity.Url)
        )
    | summarize
        Url=tostring(tolower(take_any(EntityUrl))),
        AlertTime= min(TimeGenerated),
        make_set(SystemAlertId, 100)
        by ProductName, AlertName
    // matching with 3rd party network logs and 3p Alerts
    | join kind= inner (CommonSecurityLog
        | where DeviceVendor has_any  ("Palo Alto Networks", "Fortinet", "Check Point", "Zscaler")
        | where DeviceProduct startswith "FortiGate" or DeviceProduct startswith  "PAN" or DeviceProduct startswith  "VPN" or DeviceProduct startswith "FireWall" or DeviceProduct startswith  "NSSWeblog" or DeviceProduct startswith "URL"
        | where DeviceAction != "Block"
        | where isnotempty(RequestURL)
        | project
            3plogTime=TimeGenerated,
            DeviceVendor,
            DeviceProduct,
            Activity,
            DestinationHostName,
            DestinationIP,
            RequestURL=tostring(tolower(RequestURL)),
            MaliciousIP,
            SourceUserName=tostring(tolower(SourceUserName)),
            IndicatorThreatType,
            ThreatSeverity,
            ThreatConfidence,
            SourceUserID,
            SourceHostName)
        on $left.Url == $right.RequestURL
    // matching successful Login from suspicious IP
    | join kind=inner (SigninLogs
        //filtering the Successful Login
        | where ResultType == 0
        | project
            IPAddress,
            SourceSystem,
            SigniningTime= TimeGenerated,
            OperationName,
            ResultType,
            ResultDescription,
            AlternateSignInName,
            AppDisplayName,
            AuthenticationRequirement,
            ClientAppUsed,
            RiskState,
            RiskLevelDuringSignIn,
            UserPrincipalName=tostring(tolower(UserPrincipalName)),
            Name = tostring(split(UserPrincipalName, "@")[0]),
            UPNSuffix =tostring(split(UserPrincipalName, "@")[1]))
        on $left.DestinationIP == $right.IPAddress and $left.SourceUserName == $right.UserPrincipalName
    | where SigniningTime between ((AlertTime - 6h) .. (AlertTime + 6h)) and 3plogTime between ((AlertTime - 6h) .. (AlertTime + 6h))

Phishing link click observed in network traffic

The purpose of this content is to identify successful phishing links accessed by users. Once a user clicks on a phishing link, we observe successful network activity originating from non-Microsoft network devices.

//Finding MDO Security alerts and extracting the Entities user, Domain, Ip, and URL.
    let Alert_List= dynamic([
    "Phishing link click observed in Network Traffic",
    "Phish delivered due to an IP allow policy",
    "A potentially malicious URL click was detected",
    "High Risk Sign-in Observed in Network Traffic",
    "A user clicked through to a potentially malicious URL",
    "Suspicious network connection to AitM phishing site",
    "Messages containing malicious entity not removed after delivery",
    "Email messages containing malicious URL removed after delivery",
    "Email reported by user as malware or phish",
    "Phish delivered due to an ETR override",
    "Phish not zapped because ZAP is disabled"]);
    SecurityAlert
    |where ProviderName in~ ("Office 365 Advanced Threat Protection", "OATP")
    | where AlertName in~ (Alert_List)
    //extracting Alert Entities
     | extend Entities = parse_json(Entities)
    | mv-apply Entity = Entities on
    (
    where Entity.Type == 'account'
    | extend EntityUPN = iff(isempty(Entity.UserPrincipalName), tostring(strcat(Entity.Name, "@", tostring (Entity.UPNSuffix))), tostring(Entity.UserPrincipalName))
    )
    | mv-apply Entity = Entities on
    (
    where Entity.Type == 'url'
    | extend EntityUrl = tostring(Entity.Url)
    )
    | summarize AccountUpn=tolower(tostring(take_any(EntityUPN))),Url=tostring(tolower(take_any(EntityUrl))),AlertTime= min(TimeGenerated)by SystemAlertId, ProductName
    // filtering 3pnetwork devices
    | join kind= inner (CommonSecurityLog
    | where DeviceVendor has_any  ("Palo Alto Networks", "Fortinet", "Check Point", "Zscaler")
    | where DeviceAction != "Block"
    | where DeviceProduct startswith "FortiGate" or DeviceProduct startswith  "PAN" or DeviceProduct startswith  "VPN" or DeviceProduct startswith "FireWall" or DeviceProduct startswith  "NSSWeblog" or DeviceProduct startswith "URL"
    | where isnotempty(RequestURL)
    | where isnotempty(SourceUserName)
    | extend SourceUserName = tolower(SourceUserName)
    | project
    3plogTime=TimeGenerated,
    DeviceVendor,
    DeviceProduct,
    Activity,
    DestinationHostName,
    DestinationIP,
    RequestURL=tostring(tolower(RequestURL)),
    MaliciousIP,
    Name = tostring(split(SourceUserName,"@")[0]),
    UPNSuffix =tostring(split(SourceUserName,"@")[1]),
    SourceUserName,
    IndicatorThreatType,
    ThreatSeverity,AdditionalExtensions,
    ThreatConfidence)on $left.Url == $right.RequestURL and $left.AccountUpn == $right.SourceUserName
    // Applied the condition where alert trigger 1st and then the 3p Network activity execution
    | where AlertTime between ((3plogTime - 1h) .. (3plogTime + 1h))

Suspicious URL clicked

This query correlates Microsoft Defender for Office 365 signals and Microsoft Entra ID identity data to find the relevant endpoint event BrowerLaunchedToOpen in Microsoft Defender ATP. This event reflects relevant clicks on the malicious URL in the spear phishing email recognized by Microsoft Defender for Office 365.

// Some URLs are wrapped with SafeLinks
// Let's get the unwrapped URL and clicks 
  AlertInfo
  | where ServiceSource =~ "Microsoft Defender for Office 365"
  | join (
          AlertEvidence
          | where EntityType =="Url"
          | project AlertId, RemoteUrl 
      )
      on AlertId
  | join (
          AlertEvidence
          | where EntityType =="MailMessage"
          | project AlertId, NetworkMessageId 
      )
      on AlertId
  // Get the unique NetworkMessageId for the email containing the Url
  | distinct RemoteUrl, NetworkMessageId
  | join EmailEvents on NetworkMessageId
  // Get the email RecipientEmailAddress and ObjectId from the email 
  | distinct RemoteUrl, NetworkMessageId, RecipientEmailAddress , RecipientObjectId
  | join kind = inner IdentityInfo on $left.RecipientObjectId  == $right.AccountObjectId 
  // get the UserSid of the Recipient
  | extend OnPremSid = AccountSID
  | distinct RemoteUrl, NetworkMessageId, RecipientEmailAddress , RecipientObjectId, OnPremSid 
  // Get the Url click event on the recipient device.
  | join kind = inner  
      (DeviceEvents 
      | where ActionType == "BrowserLaunchedToOpenUrl"| where isnotempty(RemoteUrl) 
      | project UrlDeviceClickTime = Timestamp , UrlClickedByUserSid = RemoteUrl, 
                  InitiatingProcessAccountSid, DeviceName, DeviceId, InitiatingProcessFileName
      ) 
     on $left.OnPremSid == $right.InitiatingProcessAccountSid and $left.RemoteUrl == $right.UrlClickedByUserSid
  | distinct UrlDeviceClickTime, RemoteUrl, NetworkMessageId, RecipientEmailAddress, RecipientObjectId, 
      OnPremSid, UrlClickedByUserSid, DeviceName, DeviceId, InitiatingProcessFileName 
  | sort by UrlDeviceClickTime desc

Anomalies in MailItemAccess by GraphAPI

This query looks for anomalies in mail item access events made by Graph API. It uses standard deviation to determine if the number of events is anomalous.

let starttime = 30d;
  let STDThreshold = 2.5;
  let allMailAccsessByGraphAPI = CloudAppEvents
  | where   ActionType == "MailItemsAccessed"
  | where Timestamp between (startofday(ago(starttime))..now())
  | where isnotempty(RawEventData['ClientAppId'] ) and RawEventData['AppId'] has "00000003-0000-0000-c000-000000000000"
  | extend ClientAppId = tostring(RawEventData['ClientAppId'])
  | extend OperationCount = toint(RawEventData['OperationCount'])
  | project Timestamp,OperationCount , ClientAppId;
  let calculateNumberOfMailPerDay = allMailAccsessByGraphAPI
  | summarize NumberOfMailPerDay =sum(toint(OperationCount)) by ClientAppId,format_datetime(Timestamp, 'y-M-d');
  let calculteAvgAndStdev=calculateNumberOfMailPerDay
  | summarize avg=avg(NumberOfMailPerDay),stev=stdev(NumberOfMailPerDay) by ClientAppId;
  calculteAvgAndStdev  | join calculateNumberOfMailPerDay on ClientAppId
  | sort by ClientAppId
  |  where NumberOfMailPerDay > avg + STDThreshold * stev
  | project ClientAppId,Timestamp,NumberOfMailPerDay,avg,stev

Indicators of compromise

IndicatorTypeDescription
micsrosoftonline[.]comDomainActor-controlled spear-phishing domain (Evilginx)
ebsumrnit[.]euDomainActor-controlled spear-phishing domain (malicious sender)
outlook-office[.]micsrosoftonline[.]comDomainActor controlled spear-phishing domain
06a5bd9cb3038e3eec1c68cb34fc3f64933dba2983e39a0b1125af8af32c8ddbSHA-256Malicious email attachment

Learn more

For the latest security research from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community, check out the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Blog: https://aka.ms/threatintelblog.

To get notified about new publications and to join discussions on social media, follow us on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-threat-intelligence, on X (formerly Twitter) at https://x.com/MsftSecIntel, and on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/threatintel.microsoft.com.

To hear stories and insights from the Microsoft Threat Intelligence community about the ever-evolving threat landscape, listen to the Microsoft Threat Intelligence podcast: https://thecyberwire.com/podcasts/microsoft-threat-intelligence.

The post New Russia-affiliated actor Void Blizzard targets critical sectors for espionage appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> Why security teams rely on Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR for managed detection and response http://approjects.co.za/?big=en-us/security/blog/2025/01/06/why-security-teams-rely-on-microsoft-defender-experts-for-xdr-for-managed-detection-and-response/ Mon, 06 Jan 2025 17:00:00 +0000 Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR is a mature and proven service that triages, investigates, and responds to incidents and hunts for threats on a customer’s behalf around the clock. Learn more about why organizations across major industries rely on it.

The post Why security teams rely on Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR for managed detection and response appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

]]> The expanding attack surface is creating more opportunities for exploitation and adding to the pressure on security leaders and teams. Increasingly, organizations are investing in managed detection and response services (MDR) to bolster their security operations center (SOC) and meet the challenge. Demand is growing rapidly: according to Frost & Sullivan, the market for MDR is expanding at a rate of 35.2% annually.1   

While there are new vendors launching MDR services regularly, many security teams are turning to Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR, a recognized leader, to deliver comprehensive coverage.1 Employed worldwide by organizations across industries, Microsoft’s team of dedicated experts proactively hunts for cyberthreats and triages, investigates, and responds to incidents on a customer’s behalf around the clock across their most critical assets. Our proven service brings together in-house security professionals and industry-leading protection with Microsoft Defender XDR to help security teams rapidly stop cyberthreats and keep their environments secure.2 

Frost & Sullivan names Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR a leader in the Frost Radar™ Managed Detection and Response for 2024.1 

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR

Give your security operations center team coverage with end-to-end protection and expertise.

Learn more
Microsoft Cyber Defense Operations Center with several people sitting at computers

Reduce the staffing burden, improve security coverage, and focus on other priorities

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR improves operational efficacy greatly while elevating an organization’s security posture to a new level. The team of experts will monitor the environment, find and halt cyberthreats, and help contain incidents faster with human-led response and remediation. With Defender Experts for XDR, organizations will expand their threat protection capabilities, reduce the number of incidents over time, and have more resources to focus on other priorities.

More experts on your side

Scaling in-house security teams remains challenging. Security experts are not only scarce but expensive. The persistent gap in open security positions has widened to 25% since 2022, meaning one in four in-house security analyst positions will remain unfilled.3 In the Forrester Consulting New Technology Project Total Economic Impact study, without Defender Experts for XDR, the in-house team size for the composite organization would need to increase by up to 30% in mid-impact scenario or 40% in high-impact scenario in year one to provide the same level of threat detection service.4 When you consider the lack of available security talent, increasing an in-house team size by 40% poses significant security concerns to CISOs. Existing security team members won’t be able to perform all the tasks required. Many will be overworked, which may lead to burnout.

With more than 34,000 full-time equivalent security engineers, Microsoft is one of the largest security companies in the world. Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR reinforces your security team with Microsoft security professionals to help reduce talent gap concerns. In addition to the team of experts, customers have additional Microsoft security resources to help with onboarding, recommendations, and strategic insights.

“Microsoft has the assets and people I needed. All the technologies, Microsoft Azure, and a full software stack end-to-end, all combined together with the fabric of security. Microsoft [Defender Experts for XDR] has the people and the ability to hire and train those people with the most upmost skill set to deal with the issues we face.”

—Head of Cybersecurity Response Architecture, financial services industry

Accelerate and expand protection against today’s cyberthreats

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR deploys quickly. That’s welcome news to organizations concerned about maturing their security program and can’t wait for new staffing and capabilities to be developed in-house. Customers can quickly leverage the deep expertise of the Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR team to tackle the increasing number of sophisticated threats. 

What is phishing?

Learn more ↗

CISOs and security teams know that phishing attacks continue to rise because cybercriminals are finding success. Email remains the most common method for phishing attacks, with 91% of all cyberattacks beginning with a phishing email. Phishing is the primary method for delivering ransomware, accounting for 45% of all ransomware attacks. Financial institutions are most targeted at 27.7% followed by nearly all other industries.5

According to internal Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR statistics, roughly 40% of halted threats are phishing.

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR is a managed extended detection and response service (MXDR). MXDR is an evolution of traditional MDR services, which primarily focuses on endpoints. Our MXDR service has greater protection across endpoints, email and productivity tools, identities, and cloud apps—ensuring the detection and disruption of many cyberthreats, such as phishing, that would not be covered by endpoint-only managed services. That expanded and consolidated coverage enables Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR to find even the most emergent threats. For example, our in-house team identified and disrupted a significant Octo Tempest operation that was working across previously siloed domains. 

The reduction in the likelihood of breaches with Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR is roughly 20% and is worth $261,000 to $522,000 over three years with Defender Experts.4

In addition to detecting, triaging, and responding to cyberthreats, Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR publishes insights to keep organizations secure. That includes recent blogs on file hosting services abuse and phishing abuse of remote monitoring and management tools. As well, the MXDR service vetted roughly 45 indicators related to adversary-in-the-middle, password spray, and multifactor authentication fatigue and added them to Spectre to help keep organizations secure.

From September 2024 through November 2024, Microsoft Security published multiple cyberthreat articles covering real-world exploration topics such as Roadtools, AzureHound, Fake Palo Alto GlobalProtect, AsyncRAT via ScreenConnect, Specula C2 Framework, SectopRAT campaign, Selenium Grid for Cryptomining, and Specula.

“The Microsoft MXDR service, Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR, is helping our SOC team around the clock and taking our security posture to the next level. On our second day of using the service, there was an alert we had previously dismissed, but Microsoft continued the investigation and identified a machine in our environment that was open to the internet. It was created by a threat actor using a remote desktop protocol (RDP). Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR’s MXDR investigation and response to remediate the issue was immediately valuable to us.”

—Director of Security Operations, financial services industry

MXDR beyond the endpoint with Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR

Halt cyberthreats before they do damage

In 2024 the mean time for the average organization to identify a breach was 194 days and containment 64 days.6  Organizations must proactively look for cyberattackers across unified cross-domain telemetry versus relying solely on disparate product alerts. Proactive threat hunting is no longer a nice-to-have in an organization’s security practice. It’s a must-have to detect cyberthreats faster before they can do significant harm.

When every minute counts, Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR can help speed up the detection of an intrusion with proactive threat hunting informed by Microsoft’s threat intelligence, which tracks more than 1,500 unique cyberthreat groups and correlates insights from 78 trillion security signals per day.7

Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting proactively looks for threats around the clock across endpoints, email, identity, and cloud apps using Microsoft Defender and other signals. Threat hunting leverages advanced AI and human expertise to probe deeper and rapidly correlate and expose cyberthreats across an organization’s security stack. With visibility across diverse, cross-domain telemetry and threat intelligence, Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting extends in-house threat hunting capabilities to provide an additional layer of threat detection to improve a SOC’s overall threat response and security efficacy.

In a recent survey, 63% of organizations saw a measurable improvement in their security posture with threat hunting. 49% saw a reduction in network and endpoint attacks along with more accurate threat detection and a reduction of false positives.8

Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting enables organizations to detect and mitigate cyberthreats such as advanced persistent threats or zero-day vulnerabilities. By actively seeking out hidden risks and reducing dwell time, threat hunting minimizes potential damage, enhances incident response, and strengthens overall security posture.

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR, which includes Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting, allows customers to stay ahead of sophisticated threat actors, uncover gaps in defenses, and adapt to an ever-evolving cyberthreat landscape.

“Managed threat hunting services detect and address security threats before they become major incidents, reducing potential damage. By implementing this (Defender Experts for Hunting), we enhance our cybersecurity posture by having experts who continuously look for hidden threats, ensuring the safety of our data, reputation, and customer trust.”

—CISO, technology industry

Spend less to get more

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR helps CISOs do more with their security budgets. According to a 2024 Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study, Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR generated a project return on investment (ROI) of up to 254% with a projected net present value of up to $6.1 million for the profiled composite company.4

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR includes trusted advisors who provide insights on operationalizing Microsoft Defender XDR for optimal security efficacy. This helps reduce the burden on in-house security and IT teams so they can focus on other projects.

Beyond lowering security operations costs, the Forrester study noted Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR efficiency gains for surveyed customers, including a 49% decrease in security-related IT help desk tickets. Other productivity gains included freeing up 42% of available full time employee hours and lowering general IT security-related project hours by 20%.4

Learn how Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR can improve organizational security

Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR is Microsoft’s MXDR service. It delivers round-the-clock threat detection, investigation, and response capabilities, along with proactive threat hunting. Designed to help close the security talent gap and enhance organizational security postures, the MXDR service combines Microsoft’s advanced Microsoft Defender XDR capabilities with dedicated security experts to tackle cyberthreats like phishing, ransomware, and zero-day vulnerabilities. Offering rapid deployment, significant ROI (254%, as per Forrester), and operational efficiencies, Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR reduces incident and alerts volume, improves the security posture, and frees up in-house resources. Organizations worldwide benefit from these scalable solutions, leveraging Microsoft’s threat intelligence and security expertise to stay ahead of evolving cyberthreats.

To learn more, please visit Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR or contact your Microsoft security representative.

To learn more about Microsoft Security solutions, visit our website. Bookmark the Security blog to keep up with our expert coverage on security matters. Also, follow us on LinkedIn (Microsoft Security) and X (@MSFTSecurity) for the latest news and updates on cybersecurity.

1Frost & Sullivan names Microsoft a Leader in the Frost Radar™: Managed Detection and Response, 2024, Srikanth Shoroff. March 25, 2024.

2Microsoft a Leader in the Forrester Wave for XDR, Microsoft Security Blog. June 3, 2024.

3ISC2 Cybersecurity Workforce Report, 2024.

4Forrester Consulting study commissioned by Microsoft, 2024, New Technology: The Projected Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Defender Experts For XDR.

52024 Phishing Facts and Statistics, Identitytheft.org.

6Time to identify and contain data breaches global 2024, Statista.

7Microsoft Digital Defense Report, 2024.

8SANS 2024 Threat Hunting Survey, March 19, 2024.

The post Why security teams rely on Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR for managed detection and response appeared first on Microsoft Security Blog.

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