What techniques do attackers use to evade vulnerability scanning tools?

The following techniques are designed to hide malicious activity, exploit blind spots in scanning tools, or manipulate the tools' behavior to prevent the detection of vulnerabilities. Make sure you are tracking these and know how to defend against them. As I always say, it's better to inform your leadership, provide solutions and options, and be told to go pound sand than to be caught unaware and try to defend your ignorance. Document, Document, Document! Obfuscation Encryption and Packing Rootkits and Kernel-Level Malware Polymorphic and Metamorphic Malware Timing-Based Evasion Exploiting Scanning Tool Limitations Mimicking Legitimate Traffic Anti-VM and Anti-Sandbox Techniques Resource Exhaustion Unknown or Zero-Day Vulnerabilities

With globalization comes risk. Users, SaaS services, cloud, are no longer constrained, and relying on identification or weighing risk by IP means very little. Case in point, a customer I was working with noticed a volume of traffic from certain geographic locations. Turns out to be Starlink. The user's origin vanishes. IP geolocation wasn't very useful yet it had to be implicitly allowed, opening up the opportunity for abuse.

Attackers use various techniques to evade security vulnerability scanning tools. Five of these are: 1. Disabling security tools: They can do this by deleting or modifying the security tool's files or registry entries. 2. Masquerading: Attackers can disguise their malware as legitimate software to evade detection. 3. Obfuscating malicious code: Attackers can obfuscate their code to make it difficult for security tools to detect. 4. Lateral movement: They can do this by using stolen credentials or by exploiting vulnerabilities in other systems on the network. 5. Zero-day exploits: Zero-day exploits are vulnerabilities that are unknown to the software vendor and for which no patch is available.

KI´s können mittlerweile Codes sehr gut lesen, analysieren, verbessern und überprüfen. Ich bin mir ganz sicher, dass Startups zu diesem Thema neue Technologien entwickeln, um auch das Spoofing und Verstecken von diversen neuen Viren und somit Schwachstellen in Zukunft aufdecken können.

Attackers employ several techniques to evade vulnerability scanning tools based on timing and frequency. They often schedule their malicious activities during off-peak hours or periods when scanning is less likely, thereby reducing the chance of detection. They may use slow and low-volume attack patterns that blend in with normal network traffic, making it difficult for scanners to differentiate between legitimate and malicious activities. Attackers also frequently change their TTPs, making it hard for static scanning tools to keep up. Some sophisticated attackers even use AI and machine learning to predict when scans occur and alter their methods accordingly.

Resource exhaustion is a major challenge for organizations with limited resources, including the federal government. Key solutions involve investing in robust infrastructure, implementing rate limiting, multifactor authentication, and PKI, along with load balancing. Keeping software updated and monitoring for suspicious activities are crucial, as many scanning tools either miss threats or generate false positives. This situation calls for more thorough log reviews, where AI can play a significant role. While cloud solutions are attractive, the government should opt for a private cloud managed internally by subject matter experts, rather than relying on external resources indefinitely.

With signature or rules-based systems it is always difficult to detect attackers that are experienced and use evading techniques as they will mostly mimic normal behaviour and use normal admin tools. Behavior-based detections are superior in those cases. There are tools that baseline each individual behavior from identities to cloud services. Any new behavior, even if slow or with normal tools, will cause an anomaly and alert on that.

For any cloud infrastruture modern CNAPP tools should be equipped with behavior based detection capabilities combines with features that allow you to reduce the overall attack vector by reducing misconfiguration, remediating vulnerabilities and finding toxic identity combinations and privileges.

One of the method is traffic obfuscation, where attackers manipulate the network traffic to make it appear as regular or benign traffic, thus bypassing anomaly detection systems. They may use encryption or tunneling to hide malicious payloads or evade deep packet inspection. Also, attackers might employ IP spoofing to hide their true origin, making it difficult to trace their location or identify their intent. Another evasion technique involves slow scanning, where attackers conduct their scanning activities at a slower rate to avoid triggering rate-limiting or alert thresholds in scanning tools.

One thing we have to remember is that it’s a game of cat and mouse. Whatever tools and the protection techniques are developed are also available to the hackers as well. They constantly work to bypass the latest protection techniques. So today we are safe tomorrow we may not be. As they say, we have to prevent the attacks every time why hackers have to succeed only once. Hence we have to keep a constant watch on the latest vulnerabilities and the latest techniques and keep upgrading our sy

Ying and Yang symbolize the dual nature of reality, including technology where disruption and framework coexist. For the past 20-30 years, open systems have introduced numerous vulnerabilities in software and apps. It's wiser to start with a fortified system and gradually ease security layers for functionality, rather than trying to secure an initially open system, which may already be compromised after years of neglect or financial inability to do it properly. In today's world, every company fundamentally relies on IT. Ensuring that IT is an enabler and not a vulnerability is crucial to the success of your business. It's not cheap or easy, but it should be with you from day one! It's pay me now or pay me later like car maintenance!