Information Technology/IT
Breach intelligence, attack campaigns, and threat reports targeting the Information Technology/IT sector.
Explore Other Sectors
Information Technology/IT Threat Reports
How MCP Prompt Injection Attacks Bypassed AI Security Controls in 2024
In early 2024, cybersecurity researchers from Unit 42 uncovered a series of novel prompt injection attack vectors targeting applications built on the Model Context Protocol (MCP), an emerging technology that connects large language models (LLMs) to external data sources and tools. Threat actors exploited weaknesses in MCP sampling to inject malicious prompts, enabling sensitive data exfiltration, command execution, and unauthorized access to downstream APIs. The compromised LLM applications posed significant risks across industries utilizing MCP to enhance automation and efficiency, ultimately raising concerns over AI/ML-powered business processes. The attack highlighted urgent visibility, policy enforcement, and segmentation shortfalls in cloud-native environments. The MCP prompt injection incident underscores a surge in AI-driven threats, particularly as generative AI is rapidly being integrated into enterprise workflows. Regulatory bodies and CISOs now place a premium on robust framework adherence and continuous monitoring as generative AI vulnerabilities and supply-chain risks multiply.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
AI Agent Prompt Injection Turns GitHub Actions Into Supply Chain Backdoor
In early 2024, cybersecurity researchers at Aikido disclosed a critical supply-chain vulnerability affecting major AI coding tools such as Google Gemini, Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, and GitHub AI Inference. The flaw enables attackers to inject malicious prompts into software automation workflows like GitHub Actions, causing integrated AI agents with elevated privileges to execute unauthorized commands. Cunning use of crafted commit messages and pull requests can trick large language models into treating these inputs as actionable instructions, leading to code modifications, shell command execution, and privilege escalation within software repositories. The vulnerability, reported via responsible disclosure, has prompted urgent fixes in some tools, but similar weaknesses remain present in other platforms. This incident highlights the expanding risks of AI-powered automation in the software development supply chain. With organizations increasingly relying on LLM integrations, the potential for prompt injection and privilege abuse creates new avenues for compromise, underscoring the urgency for robust controls, regular audit, and architectural safeguards around agentic AI workflows.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
China-Linked Supply Chain Breach Exploits React2Shell Flaw in 2025
In mid-2025, multiple China-linked threat actors launched widespread exploitation of the React2Shell vulnerability (CVE-2025-55182), a critical supply-chain flaw impacting React and Next.js applications. Within hours of the flaw’s public disclosure, attackers initiated automated scanning and weaponization campaigns, targeting internet-exposed services to quickly gain unauthorized, remote code execution. Successful intrusions enabled attackers to harvest sensitive data, escalate privileges, and pivot laterally within affected cloud environments. The rapid adoption of malicious payloads and swift exploitation before most organizations could patch led to substantial business risk, data loss, and potential compliance violations across sectors. This incident underscores an escalated threat landscape where nation-state actors rapidly exploit newly-disclosed supply-chain vulnerabilities. The speed and scope of these attacks reflect a significant uptick in zero-day exploitation campaigns and highlight the urgent need for organizations to strengthen patching velocity, endpoint monitoring, and east-west segmentation controls.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
Inotiv 2025 Ransomware Breach: Pharma Data at Risk
In August 2025, Inotiv, a leading American pharmaceutical firm, suffered a significant ransomware attack resulting in the theft of sensitive personal data belonging to thousands of individuals. Threat actors infiltrated the company’s network, deployed ransomware, and exfiltrated confidential information before encrypting internal systems. The breach led to data exposure and operational disruption, prompting Inotiv to notify impacted parties and regulatory authorities. Forensic investigation indicated unauthorized access over an extended period prior to the ransomware detonation, increasing the scope of compromised information. This incident highlights the escalating risks faced by the pharmaceutical industry, where highly regulated data attracts sophisticated ransomware groups. The resurgence of data-exfiltration ransomware tactics underlines the urgent need for advanced segmentation, egress controls, and integrated detection to defend against evolving threats and meet compliance expectations.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
CISA Discloses PRC Hackers Using BRICKSTORM Backdoor for Stealthy U.S. System Access
In June 2025, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) reported that state-sponsored hackers affiliated with the People's Republic of China (PRC) utilized a newly identified backdoor dubbed BRICKSTORM to infiltrate and maintain long-term access within VMware vSphere and Windows environments of U.S. critical infrastructure entities. The campaign started months prior, leveraging advanced persistent threat (APT) tactics such as lateral movement, encrypted C2 channels, and sophisticated evasion techniques to bypass network defenses and persist undetected. This led to extensive exfiltration of sensitive data and raised major concerns about the resilience of core U.S. operational systems. The BRICKSTORM attack signals a rising tide of highly targeted intrusions on virtualization platforms, as nation-state actors adopt increasingly stealthy and persistent approaches. Organizations must now contend with the growing complexity and scale of APT operations, which often elude legacy tools and monitoring strategies.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
Active Command Injection Attacks Hit Array AG Series Gateways in 2025
In mid-2025, JPCERT/CC reported that a command injection vulnerability in Array Networks AG Series secure access gateways had been actively exploited in the wild since at least August of that year. The flaw, residing in the DesktopDirect remote desktop access feature, allowed unauthenticated attackers to execute arbitrary commands on targeted devices. The vulnerability, lacking a CVE at the time of disclosure, was patched by Array Networks in May 2025, but unpatched systems remained exposed to attacks that could lead to further compromise and unauthorized network access. This incident underscores the persistent risks of unpatched infrastructure and weak segmentation in network environments. The rise of zero-day exploits targeting remote access solutions combined with increased regulatory scrutiny makes rapid detection, patching, and least privilege policy enforcement more critical than ever.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
Supply-Chain Emergency: Critical XXE Bug (CVE-2025-66516) in Apache Tika Imperils Enterprises
In December 2025, a critical XML External Entity (XXE) vulnerability, CVE-2025-66516, with a maximum CVSS score of 10.0, was discovered in multiple core Apache Tika modules. This flaw enables unauthenticated attackers to exploit XXE processing to remotely access sensitive files, exfiltrate data, and launch further attacks through maliciously crafted XML payloads. Because Apache Tika is widely employed in data extraction and content analysis across enterprise, cloud, and supply-chain systems, the exposure has immediate downstream risk for any organizations leveraging impacted Tika libraries. The incident highlights a significant supply-chain security challenge, reinforcing the urgency for immediate patching and improved review of third-party open-source components. Increasingly, threat actors are exploiting foundational software dependencies to bypass traditional security perimeters, making software supply-chain vigilance a key priority for 2025 and beyond.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
Chinese Hackers Exploit React2Shell RCE—Critical React Server Vulnerability in 2025
In December 2025, two Chinese nation-state threat groups rapidly began exploiting CVE-2025-55182—dubbed 'React2Shell'—a critical unauthenticated remote code execution vulnerability affecting React Server Components (RSC). Within hours of public disclosure, attackers scanned for and targeted vulnerable servers globally, leveraging the flaw to gain full control over application environments, execute arbitrary commands, and establish persistent footholds for lateral movement. The wide adoption of React in enterprise and SaaS environments increased the exposure and impact of these attacks, putting sensitive business-critical data at risk and causing major security teams to issue rapid patch advisories. This incident underscores the growing speed with which advanced threat actors weaponize zero-day vulnerabilities in widely used software frameworks. It highlights the urgent need for rapid vulnerability management, enhanced east-west segmentation, and robust threat detection, as attackers increasingly exploit supply chain and development stack exposures in cloud and hybrid environments.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
CISA Issues Stark Warning on Ongoing Brickstorm Backdoor Attacks
In early 2024, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a warning regarding sustained state-sponsored attacks targeting VMware vSphere environments, attributed to China-linked advanced persistent threat (APT) groups. These actors deployed the 'Brickstorm' backdoor to compromise government and technology sector organizations, exploiting vulnerabilities to achieve persistence and lateral movement within affected networks. The intrusion enabled attackers to bypass security controls, maintain privileged access, and exfiltrate sensitive information, highlighting a persistent threat targeting virtualization infrastructure. This incident is notable as it reflects a concerning evolution in attacker tactics, specifically the abuse of virtualization platforms as an entry vector for espionage. The ongoing campaign underscores the urgent need for enhanced detection, segmentation, and defense against stealthy operations in hybrid and cloud environments.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
M&S & Co-op Group 2025: Identity-Based Vishing Unleashes Ransomware Chaos
In early 2025, Marks & Spencer (M&S) and Co-op Group, two major UK retailers, suffered significant ransomware attacks following sophisticated vishing campaigns. Attackers impersonated IT support and targeted outsourced helpdesk staff to capture corporate credentials, enabling unauthorized access to internal networks. Once inside, threat actors leveraged overprivileged accounts and weak segmentation to laterally move and exfiltrate sensitive data, ultimately deploying ransomware that disrupted operations. The incidents resulted in direct losses exceeding £500 million (USD 667 million), with long-term impacts including reputational harm and regulatory scrutiny. This breach underscores the ongoing threat of identity-based attacks, particularly those exploiting social engineering and credential harvesting to bypass perimeter defenses. With the rise of distributed workforces, cloud adoption, and third-party supply chains, organizations of all sizes remain vulnerable to similar tactics, making identity security and robust privilege management more urgent than ever.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
React2Shell: China-Nexus Groups Target Supply Chains with Critical React Vulnerability
In early 2024, a critical zero-day vulnerability in the widely used React JavaScript library—dubbed React2Shell—was actively exploited in the wild by sophisticated China-nexus threat actors. Attackers leveraged compromised software supply chains to infiltrate organizations during regular package updates, gaining access via vulnerable dependency injection into production environments. Once inside, adversaries orchestrated lateral movement to exfiltrate sensitive data and disrupt business operations across sectors, leveraging encrypted communication channels and advanced stealth techniques. The incident has underscored the significant risk posed by supply-chain weaknesses in core developer tools and frameworks, amplifying concerns among enterprises and regulators alike. This breach reflects a surge in supply-chain attacks targeting popular open-source components, exposing systemic vulnerabilities beyond traditional perimeter defenses. The rapid weaponization of techniques by nation-state actors highlights the urgent need for zero trust segmentation, proactive patching, and real-time threat visibility within software development ecosystems.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
China’s Brickstorm Malware Campaign: The New Face of State-Level US Espionage in 2024
In 2024, U.S. and Canadian cybersecurity authorities, together with threat analysts from Google and CrowdStrike, disclosed an extensive, ongoing cyber-espionage campaign attributed to China-linked state actors known as Warp Panda and UNC5221. Utilizing the advanced Brickstorm malware, attackers achieved undetected persistence within critical infrastructure and government agency networks for an average of over a year, beginning as early as 2022. Brickstorm, targeting VMware vSphere and Windows environments, enabled stealthy lateral movement, automated reinfection, and the theft of sensitive identity and configuration data. The campaign exploited cloud misconfigurations, edge device vulnerabilities, and under-monitored zones, impacting dozens of U.S. organizations and associated downstream victims. This incident reflects the continued evolution of state-sponsored Chinese cyber-operations. Its strategic targeting, tradecraft sophistication, and stealth tactics represent persistent threats for both government and private sector organizations managing hybrid or multi-cloud environments.
8 months ago
Kill Chain
Stop Active Cloud Data Exfiltration
Aviatrix Rapid Containment helps teams instantly identify what data is leaving the environment, from which workload, and where it’s going — during an active breach.
Looking for threats in a different sector?
Browse All Threat Reports