Google-owned Mandiant on Friday mentioned it recognized an “enlargement in risk exercise” that makes use of tradecraft per extortion-themed assaults orchestrated by a financially motivated hacking group often known as ShinyHunters.
The assaults leverage superior voice phishing (aka vishing) and bogus credential harvesting websites mimicking focused corporations to realize unauthorized entry to sufferer environments by amassing sign-on (SSO) credentials and multi-factor authentication (MFA) codes.
The tip aim of the assaults is to focus on cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) purposes to siphon delicate knowledge and inside communications and extort victims.
The tech big’s risk intelligence staff mentioned it is monitoring the exercise beneath a number of clusters, together with UNC6661, UNC6671, and UNC6240 (aka ShinyHunters), in order to account for the chance that these teams could possibly be evolving their modus operandi or mimicking beforehand noticed techniques.
“Whereas this technique of focusing on identification suppliers and SaaS platforms is per our prior observations of risk exercise previous ShinyHunters-branded extortion, the breadth of focused cloud platforms continues to broaden as these risk actors search extra delicate knowledge for extortion,” Mandiant famous.
“Additional, they look like escalating their extortion techniques with latest incidents, together with harassment of sufferer personnel, amongst different techniques.”
Particulars of the vishing and credential theft exercise are as follows –
- UNC6661 has been noticed pretending to be IT employees in calls to staff at focused sufferer organizations, directing them to credential harvesting hyperlinks beneath the guise of instructing them to replace their multi-factor authentication (MFA) settings. The exercise was recorded between early and mid-January 2026.
- The stolen credentials are then used to register their very own machine for MFA after which transfer laterally throughout the community to exfiltrate knowledge from SaaS platforms. In at the very least one case, the risk actor weaponized their entry to compromised electronic mail accounts to ship extra phishing emails to contacts at cryptocurrency-focused corporations. The emails had been subsequently deleted to cowl up the tracks. That is adopted by extortion exercise carried out by UNC6240.
- UNC6671 has additionally been recognized as impersonating IT employees to deceive victims as a part of efforts to acquire their credentials and MFA authentication codes on victim-branded credential harvesting websites since early January 2026. In at the very least some situations, the risk actors gained entry to Okta buyer accounts. UNC6671 has additionally leveraged PowerShell to obtain delicate knowledge from SharePoint and OneDrive.
- The variations between UNC6661 and UNC6671 relate to using totally different area registrars for registering the credential harvesting domains (NICENIC for UNC6661 and Tucows for UNC6671), in addition to the truth that an extortion electronic mail despatched following UNC6671 exercise didn’t overlap with identified UNC6240 indicators.
- This means that totally different units of individuals could also be concerned, illustrating the amorphous nature of those cybercrime teams. What’s extra, the focusing on of cryptocurrency companies means that the risk actors can also be trying to discover additional avenues for monetary achieve.
To counter the risk posed to SaaS platforms, Google has outlined an extended listing of hardening, logging, and detection suggestions –
- Enhance assist desk processes, together with requiring personnel to require a stay video name to confirm their identification
- Restrict entry to trusted egress factors and bodily places; implement sturdy passwords; and take away SMS, telephone name, and electronic mail as authentication strategies
- Limit management-plane entry, audit for uncovered secrets and techniques and implement machine entry controls
- Implement logging to extend visibility into identification actions, authorizations, and SaaS export behaviors
- Detect MFA machine enrollment and MFA life cycle modifications; search for OAuth/app authorization occasions that recommend mailbox manipulation exercise utilizing utilities like ToogleBox E mail Recall, or identification occasions occurring outdoors regular enterprise hours
“This exercise just isn’t the results of a safety vulnerability in distributors’ merchandise or infrastructure,” Google mentioned. “As an alternative, it continues to spotlight the effectiveness of social engineering and underscores the significance of organizations shifting in the direction of phishing-resistant MFA the place attainable. Strategies similar to FIDO2 safety keys or passkeys are immune to social engineering in ways in which push-based, or SMS authentication will not be.”
