A new Trojan-delivered spyware that uses Telegram to exfiltrate stolen information. Using Telegram as a Command and Control (CnC) channel allows the malware some anonymity, as Telegram is a legitimate messaging application with 200 million monthly active users.
The malware is being advertised on black market forums as “Masad Clipper and Stealer”. It steals browser data, which might contain usernames, passwords and credit card information. Masad Stealer also automatically replaces cryptocurrency wallets from the clipboard with its own.
Masad Stealer sends all of the information it collects – and receive commands from – a Telegram bot controlled by the threat actor deploying that instance of Masad. Because Masad is being sold as off-the-shelf malware, it will be deployed by multiple threat actors who may or may not be the original malware writers.
When Masad Stealer is executed, it drops itself in %APPDATA%\folder_name}\{file_name}, where folder_name and file_name are defined in the binary. Examples include amd64_usbhub3.inf.resources and ws2_32.exe, respectively. As a persistence mechanism, mMasad Stealer creates a scheduled task that will start itself every one minute.
It zips this information into a file using 7zip utility, which is bundled into the malware binary.