High
Trend Micro published a blog post analyzing a variant of the MyKings botnet malware that includes a new bootloader persistence mechanism. The threat was originally detected through EternalBlue exploitation activity, which MyKings uses to propagate laterally. Upon install, the MyKings malware establishes persistence via several different methods, including through registry Run keys, scheduled tasks, and WMI objects. This most recent variant also expanded its persistence capabilities by adding a bootloader component. The bootkit alters kernel-level functions in order to ensure that the malicious code is executed on startup and that the difficulty of cleaning up the infection is greatly increased. The bootkit and other persistence mechanisms are used to perform a series of actions that eventually reach the goal of downloading additional payloads. One of the main payload types distributed by MyKings is cryptocurrency miners, which serve the purpose of providing a profit to the botnet operators.
Exposure of sensitive information
URLs
Malware Hash (MD5/SHA1/SH256)