• Home
  • Cyber Crime
  • Cyber warfare
  • APT
  • Data Breach
  • Deep Web
  • Digital ID
  • Hacking
  • Hacktivism
  • Intelligence
  • Internet of Things
  • Laws and regulations
  • Malware
  • Mobile
  • Reports
  • Security
  • Social Networks
  • Terrorism
  • ICS-SCADA
  • POLICIES
  • Contact me
MUST READ

U.S. CISA adds Cisco ISE and PaperCut NG/MF flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog

 | 

Critical WordPress Post SMTP plugin flaw exposes 200K+ sites to full takeover

 | 

Scattered Spider targets VMware ESXi in using social engineering

 | 

China-linked group Fire Ant exploits VMware and F5 flaws since early 2025

 | 

Allianz Life data breach exposed the data of most of its 1.4M customers

 | 

SECURITY AFFAIRS MALWARE NEWSLETTER ROUND 55

 | 

Security Affairs newsletter Round 534 by Pierluigi Paganini – INTERNATIONAL EDITION

 | 

Law enforcement operations seized BlackSuit ransomware gang’s darknet sites

 | 

Arizona woman sentenced for aiding North Korea in U.S. IT job fraud scheme

 | 

Operation CargoTalon targets Russia’s aerospace with EAGLET malware,

 | 

Unpatched flaw in EoL LG LNV5110R cameras lets hackers gain Admin access

 | 

Koske, a new AI-Generated Linux malware appears in the threat landscape

 | 

Mitel patches critical MiVoice MX-ONE Auth bypass flaw

 | 

Coyote malware is first-ever malware abusing Windows UI Automation

 | 

SonicWall fixed critical flaw in SMA 100 devices exploited in Overstep malware attacks

 | 

DSPM & AI Are Booming: $17.87B and $4.8T Markets by 2033

 | 

Stealth backdoor found in WordPress mu-Plugins folder

 | 

U.S. CISA adds CrushFTP, Google Chromium, and SysAid flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog

 | 

U.S. CISA urges FCEB agencies to fix two Microsoft SharePoint flaws immediately and added them to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog

 | 

Sophos fixed two critical Sophos Firewall vulnerabilities

 | 
  • Home
  • Cyber Crime
  • Cyber warfare
  • APT
  • Data Breach
  • Deep Web
  • Digital ID
  • Hacking
  • Hacktivism
  • Intelligence
  • Internet of Things
  • Laws and regulations
  • Malware
  • Mobile
  • Reports
  • Security
  • Social Networks
  • Terrorism
  • ICS-SCADA
  • POLICIES
  • Contact me
  • Home
  • Breaking News
  • Cyber Crime
  • Cyber warfare
  • Malware
  • Operation Woolen Goldfish, a hacking campaign in the wild

Operation Woolen Goldfish, a hacking campaign in the wild

Pierluigi Paganini March 21, 2015

Security experts at Trend micro uncovered a new hacking campaign dubbed Operation Woolen Goldfish likely run by a threat actor group known as Rocket Kitten.

Security experts at Trend Micro have uncovered a new cyber espionage campaign that is targeting a number of European organisations and businesses. The attackers run a spear phishing campaign that was dubbed by the experts Operation Woolen Goldfish.

“The first of these campaigns has already been exposed at 31C3 by Tillman Werner and Gadi Evron. That campaign started with traditional spear phishing e-mails that use basic social engineering techniques to entice the targeted users to open a Microsoft Office file.” states the report published by Trend Micro.

Trend Micro researchers speculate that the threat actors behind the Operation Woolen Goldfish are linked with another espionage campaign dubbed the “Rocket Kitten” that was spotted in December 2014.

“Rocket Kitten refers to a cyber threat group that has been hitting different public and private Israeli/European organizations. It has launched two campaigns so far: a malware campaign that exclusively makes use of GHOLE malware, as well as a targeted attack dubbed as “Operation Woolen-GoldFish” that’s possibly state-sponsored.” states Trend Micro.

Rocket Kitten campaign presented a number of similarities with this last wave of cyber attacks, also in that case the attack chain started with a spear phishing campaign, the messages were crafted to lure victims into open malicious Office files loaded with a “Ghole” malware.

Operation Woolen Goldfish vs Rocket Kitten

The attacks reported to the experts at Trend Micro were characterized by indicators of a specific malware family.

“The alert showed an infected Microsoft Excel file that soon proved to have been launched by Rocket Kitten.”

Respect The Rotten Kitten, the Woolen Goldfish campaign appears far more sophisticated.

“By the end of 2014 we saw significant changes in the attack behavior of the Rocket Kitten group in terms of spear-phishing campaigns and malware infection schemes,” states the paper.

Both campaigns exploit the GHOLE malware, but in the Operation Woolen Goldfish the spear-phishing messages embedded with a malicious link that leads to a malicious file stored on OneDrive cloud storage.

GHOLE isn’t the unique variant of malware used by attackers, recently the experts discovered samples of a keylogger known as the CWoolger keylogger.

“The attackers used a OneDrive link in their campaign. OneDrive is a free online cloud storage system from Microsoft that comes with several gigabytes of data storage capacity,” explained the report.

“Once executed, the file drops a non-malicious PowerPoint file used as a decoy file, while silently infecting the system with a variant of the CWoolger keylogger.”

Researchers at Trend Micro discovered that the CWoolger keylogger was developed by a hacking crew named “Wool3n.H4t”, which is believed to have been involved in the Rocket Kitten attacks.

“Consistent with the other malware used by the threat actors involved in Operation Woolen Goldfish, the command and control reference is hard-coded as an IP address in the binary,” reports the paper.

“A domain name was not used. Moreover, it lands on the system with a name, which is very similar to some Ghole malware variants [used by Rocket Kitten].”

Experts speculate that the attackers are still operating and it is likely that they are running a new campaign using new hacking tools.

“From our findings we can definitely say that threat actor team is alive and active,” state the experts.” With all the evidence, Rocket Kitten’s attacks can be construed as politically-motivated, as the targeted entities do share a particular interest in the Islamic Republic of Iran. While motives behind targeted attack campaigns differ, the end results are one and the same: shift in power control either in the economically or politically.”

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs – Operation Woolen Goldfish, APT)


facebook linkedin twitter

APT cyber espionage Ghole Hackers malware Operation Woolen Goldfish Rocket Kitten

you might also like

Pierluigi Paganini July 28, 2025
U.S. CISA adds Cisco ISE and PaperCut NG/MF flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog
Read more
Pierluigi Paganini July 28, 2025
Critical WordPress Post SMTP plugin flaw exposes 200K+ sites to full takeover
Read more

leave a comment

newsletter

Subscribe to my email list and stay
up-to-date!

    recent articles

    U.S. CISA adds Cisco ISE and PaperCut NG/MF flaws to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog

    Security / July 28, 2025

    Critical WordPress Post SMTP plugin flaw exposes 200K+ sites to full takeover

    Security / July 28, 2025

    Scattered Spider targets VMware ESXi in using social engineering

    Cyber Crime / July 28, 2025

    China-linked group Fire Ant exploits VMware and F5 flaws since early 2025

    Hacking / July 28, 2025

    Allianz Life data breach exposed the data of most of its 1.4M customers

    Data Breach / July 27, 2025

    To contact me write an email to:

    Pierluigi Paganini :
    pierluigi.paganini@securityaffairs.co

    LEARN MORE

    QUICK LINKS

    • Home
    • Cyber Crime
    • Cyber warfare
    • APT
    • Data Breach
    • Deep Web
    • Digital ID
    • Hacking
    • Hacktivism
    • Intelligence
    • Internet of Things
    • Laws and regulations
    • Malware
    • Mobile
    • Reports
    • Security
    • Social Networks
    • Terrorism
    • ICS-SCADA
    • POLICIES
    • Contact me

    Copyright@securityaffairs 2024

    We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept All”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. However, you may visit "Cookie Settings" to provide a controlled consent.
    Cookie SettingsAccept All
    Manage consent

    Privacy Overview

    This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities...
    Necessary
    Always Enabled
    Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
    Non-necessary
    Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
    SAVE & ACCEPT