A newly discovered variant of a long-known malware loader adds the ability to control the victim from afar.
VBScript has long been an attack vector that could bring malicious software to an infected machine. But what if it could do more? What if VBScript could open a door to allow a PHP application access that would take control of a computer, making it part of a botnet? That's precisely the scenario in a newly described campaign called ARS VBS Loader, a variant of a popular downloader called SafeLoader VBS.
The new ARS VBS Loader, described by researchers at Flashpoint, downloads malware and provides remote-control access to a botnet controller, making it both a malware loader and a RAT, or remote access trojan. Paul Burbage, senior malware researcher at Flashpoint, says that he first noticed the new loader variant being sold on Russian malware sites in December 2017. It was, he says, being sold as a FUD ASPC (VBScript) loader — with "FUD" in this case meaning "fully undetectable."
Burbage says that there are two characteristics of ARS VBS that make it highly unusual. The first is persistence; the second is the remote access capability.
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