Scams & Phishing News Phishing emails increasingly use SVG attachments to evade detection

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https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/phishing-emails-increasingly-use-svg-attachments-to-evade-detection/

Threat actors increasingly use Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) attachments to display phishing forms or deploy malware while evading detection.

Most images on the web are JPG or PNG files, which are made of grids of tiny squares called pixels. Each pixel has a specific color value, and together, these pixels form the entire image.

SVG, or Scalable Vector Graphics, displays images differently, as instead of using pixels, the images are created through lines, shapes, and text described in textual mathematical formulas in the code.

The use of SVG attachments in phishing campaigns is nothing new, with BleepingComputer reporting about their usage in previous Qbot malware campaigns and as a way to hide malicious scripts.

However, threat actors are increasingly using SVG files in their phishing campaigns according to security researcher MalwareHunterTeam, who shared recent samples [1, 2] with BleepingComputer.

The problem is that since these files are mostly just textual representations of images, they tend not to be detected by security software that often. From samples seen by BleepingComputer and uploaded to VirusTotal, at the most, they have one or two detections by security software.

With that said, receiving an SVG attachment is not common for legitimate emails, and should immediately be treated with suspicion.

Unless you are a developer and expect to receive these types of attachments, it is safer to delete any emails containing them.

Phishing emails increasingly use SVG attachments to evade detection

Threat actors increasingly use Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) attachments to display phishing forms or deploy malware while evading detection.

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