Last Updated: Monday May 09, 2005
Michael Ligh (michael.ligh@mnin.org)
Thanks to SANS for linking here from their Diary on June 30, 2005
The content here claims a software author’s program, as it is readily available on the net for download, is bundled with a trojan of some sort. The author was given ample time and proof to either validate or dispute this claim. Since neither occurred and several people are awaiting information on this program, I am releasing it now, without the author’s input. As needed, revisions may occur in time if a response from the author is received.
This paper was built by combining two smaller pieces of work with tcposmod.exe. The first part presented here is the relevant chapter from a multi-topic paper completed at the beginning of May 2003. The second was completed in mid-June and serves to fill the gaps left by the initial research. Thus far tcposmod has either been unexplored or terribly undocumented (If you don't believe me, try searching for it). Most major conclusions are near the end; while the earlier sections discuss the methods used to draw them.
This section has an interesting beginning and middle, however the ending is disappointing. So, I’ll just get the ending out of the way: I don’t know when this software made its way onto my laptop, nor do I know where it came from or how it got there. Spyware has a reputation of accompanying the install of programs or simply downloaded files. The possibilities are far too many to even attempt re-acquisition in search of its source. Rather, I will concentrate on the more manageable factor: what it does.
The program is named tcposmod.exe and was found in the C:\WINNT\system32 directory of a Windows 2000 machine. I will explain how it came to my attention later on. It was removed from the system immediately and backed up to floppy disk for research purposes such as this. There was also a value of “DSS” added to the registry along with a pointer to the executable (C:\WINNT\system32\tcposmod.exe) at this location:
MyComputer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\CurrentVersion\Run
I noted that this path also provides residence to Norton Antivirus and DU Meter strings on my personal system; which causes both programs to run at boot-up. In this manner, the tcposmod.exe process is started automatically by Windows each time the computer is booted; and remains active for as long as the computer is on. It also means that once placed on the drive, it cannot become active until the first reboot. Since many Windows applications require a reboot following installation, spyware that comes along with it is quickly activated.
So, to begin the monitoring process, I copied the program from the floppy
disk back to its original directory and added the registry string at the
correct location. Just to verify it would not become active before the
reboot, I checked Task Manager for any running process named tcposmod.exe and
the DOS ‘netstat’ command for any invalid open connections:
there were none. It was time to reboot.
DU Meter (Download / Upload Meter) is a program that provides graphical
output when the system is downloading or uploading data. It also calculates
statistics on the amounts of data transferred within specified time periods.
This is how the existence of tcposmod.exe was first brought to my attention -
red peaks dominating the graph when I was neither downloading nor uploading
intentionally.
I allowed tcposmod.exe to run for almost 8 minutes (it began at startup, as predicted). During this time frame, 2.95 MB of data were downloaded and 359.8 KB were uploaded. The uploading, based on such a small amount, was most likely my computer’s outgoing ACK’s to the data being downloaded; letting the sender know it had been received.
Task Manager revealed the process using 7,054 KB of RAM when idle. Once an Internet connection was provided, this value peaked at 21,372 KB. During the flood of communications, tcposmod.exe was draining as much as 79% of the CPU resources.
My Linksys firewall/router logged the stats from each outgoing packet. Connections initiated by tcposmod.exe seem to be limited to port 80; except one to 137 (netbios) and one to 443 (SSL). Among the remote locations were www.clickonteens.com, www.instantpills.com, www.hackology.com, www.custombabes.com, and even www.microsoft.com. The log is composed of 144 connections (see Appendix B), which is about 18 per minute.
tcposmod.exe resides on a hard drive w ith the hidden, read-only, and archive attributes set. It is (falsely) copyrighted as “Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1981-2002” and reports having an original name of dss6.exe.
The first experiment revealed tcposmod’s most noticeable behavior was to initiate outbound connections at a rapid pace. At that point we were unable to discover little else besides how many connection attempts were made, where they were aimed, and the bandwidth this consumed. This limitation prevented anything more than speculation regarding the nature of the packets transmitted and data within them. The purpose of this second round of testing was to go beyond this limitation and spy on the so-called spyware, Trojan, or whatever it is.
Method
The experiment will be conducted again on the same Windows 2000 laptop. This
time instead of a Linksys router as the source of outgoing connection logs,
there stands in its place a Linux machine through which all traffic bound for
either direction must first pass. Running Snort in Network Intrusion
Detection System mode, all traffic set on the wire by my laptop will be
sucked up into Snort’s realm of packet capture.
The laptop can be identified on the network with its IP address of 192.168.1.102. Because the Linux system is now the firewall and default gateway for all other systems on the network as well, I will collect the traffic with the following snort configuration file and command line options (if not I would have to shuffle through 4 computer’s traffic rather than 1):
var LAPTOP 192.168.1.102/32 var HOME_NET 192.168.1.0/24 var EXTERNAL_NET !$HOME_NET var DNS_SERVERS [204.60.0.2/32,204.60.0.3/32] output log_tcpdump: tcposmod.log pass udp $DNS_SERVERS 53 <> $HOME_NET any log ip $LAPTOP any <> $EXTERNAL_NET any [root@fw]# snort -i eth1 -c ~/snort.conf -l ~/log -b
What this does is tell Snort to output all traffic to and from the laptop and store it in a separate log file. It essentially ignores any traffic generated by other machines on the network. I also opted to let the laptop's DNS queries pass through the filter, as they would not be part of the suspicious traffic. This contributes simplicity and organization to the post-experiment log auditing task, which otherwise would be rather hefty.
This time, tcposmod was activated for a duration of 6 minutes. The resulting traffic log is 8 MB as a text file. Active Ports 1.4 was used to ensure this traffic was indeed generated by the process named tcposmod.exe. Now, to keep the suspense rolling I will discuss where this thing came from in the first place. The answer is: mungabunga.exe (HTTP Brute Forcer 1.0.3). How is that an answer? The mungabunga brute forcer is a web-based password cracker. It can be downloaded from several internet sites, mainly www.hackology.com, which is the home of the software’s author. Upon installation, tcposmod is covertly carried along.
Though I say "covertly," the file's name is actually flashed during the installation process of mungabunga.exe. Most users would not notice this, however my laptop is six years old, thus anciently slow; and I was staring. Deleting the mungabunga executable and other files in its directory does not remove tcposmod.
Interestingly enough, the following paragraph can be found on Hackology’s website:
We have been informed of some web sites distributing altered copies of this program, please only download our software from our site. It appears as though some web sites bundled the program with a home grown Trojan. The Trojan is not harmful in any way just annoying (according to our tests). In addition, Trend Micro (apparently) has issued a patch for the Trojan.
If you have downloaded our software from another site, we are in no way liable. Please do not download from unapproved sites, or sites that you cannot trust. We suggest you only download our software from our site, or other sites that are approved by The Hackology Network.
Regards, MB [1]
At the time of this reading, it was unclear if the Trojan referred to in this message was tcposmod.exe. The following email to MB himself revealed that it was not, as he was not aware of such a program.
Received: Wednesday, 11 June 2003 11:29 PM
To: ligh@snet.net
From: mb@hackology.com
Subject: RE:Tcposmod.exe
Michael,
We are not aware of such a Trojan... in order for us to test your claim, please tell us what monitoring software or firewall software you are using or have used to detect this trojan... once done... we will try to replicate your findings on our end exactly as you did, so that we may find the culprit. Our traditional methods did not work.
Once again, do let us know!
-----Original Message-----
> Sent: Wednesday, 11 June 2003 6:19 PM
> To: mb@hackology.com
> From: ligh@snet.net
> Subject: Tcposmod.exe
> MB,
> I'm writing to inquire about the executable named tcposmod
that
> accompanies mungabunga.exe (1.0.3) and adds a registry key to run
> at startup. During a test it initiated 144 TCP connections to port
> 80 of web servers around the net in about 8 minutes. It doesn't seem
> to do more than fill up the temporary internet files folder with
> random web page material.
> I read your trojan warning and agree if this is what you refer to
> that its not harmful, just annoying. But, mungabunga was downloaded
> from hackology.com and no other site. Actually the link on hackology
> to download it leads to ns13.eb1.biz at 69.1.71.205, so I don't know
> if that is affiliated with you.
> Well, I just wanted to know if you were aware of it and if you
are:
> what purpose does this program serve?
> Thanks,
> MH
I have sent my proof and am awaiting a response, which I may or may not get. Meanwhile, we still have a nearly 8 MB text file of Snort’s output to talk about. This comprehensive log suggests several key findings:
We know tcposmod.exe is installed under our noses along with mungabunga.exe downloaded from Hackology.com. It seems to be a standalone program capable of binding to ports, sending and receiving data, and interacting with other files and directories on the machine. We know where tcposmod.exe resides on the hard drive and the value of its corresponding registry entry. Removal of these two will effectively bring the overt suspicious behavior to a halt. I say ‘overt’ rather than ‘all’ because what this research presents cannot be considered exhaustive without source code of the program to validate.
In other words, the longest period of time tcposmod was allowed to run was 8 minutes. It is possible that behavior might change drastically on the 9th minute. It is possible other actions are being carried out against the local system and the noisy network activity is just a disguise. It also may behave differently when run in conjunction with mungabunga.exe.
Speculation of this will remain until MB or someone with reverse engineering skill can produce some source code. Or, simply track down the person who wrote and inserted tcposmod into MB’s program, since it was not him (as he says); and ask what else (if anything) it does. A possible motive could be to launch a distributed denial of service against the hosts or domains visited by tcposmod. If present on several machines on the same LAN, the program could easily consume a majority of the network’s own resources as well.
Alright so I hope I'm not the only person who thinks this is funny. Over a year ago we found tcposmod and notified the author of the program it was bundled with. The author claimed his servers were hacked and code inserted into his program. The irony here is that a year later, the author's program, which happens to be a hacking script for brute force password guessing, is still "infected" with the tcposmod trojan. I HAVE to believe that MB (see the emails below) and his crew are better coders than that. Anyone who overlooks an entire executable packed within a program they update frequently and rave about has serious security issues.
I thought about wasting some more time on tcposmod because it seems people are still getting infected with it, quite often; and there is still a major shortage of information about it on the web. The test setup is a little more advanced than a year go, which gives us some extra tools and more analytical capabilities as well. I built a Windows 2000 VMware machine and downloaded a copy of munga bunga brute forcer (mbhttpbf.exe) from hackology.com. I installed cygwin to get some basic Unix tools onboard (mainly find) and proceeded to install the brute forcer. I quickly checked if tcposmod.exe was in C:\WINNT\System32 and at the registry location for auto start at boot; and then rebooted the machine. The process ran for a few minutes as once again, I captured all the network traffic at the gateway.
The first HTTP GET request that originated from the machine was for a file named /data/fxn.txt, which was encoded or encrpyted in some format I'm not able to read, though I can guess with a high degree of confidence that this is the file in which the domains/IP addresses exist. Once the file was dowloaded, tcposmod began initiating connections to various sites, once again, probably derived from the content of fxn.txt. There were:
mhale@fire:~> grep "\*\*\*\*\*\*S\*" tcposmod.cap | wc -l 329
mhale@fire:~> grep TCP tcposmod.cap | grep TTL | awk '{print $3}' | egrep -v 192.168.1.70 | cut -d: -f1 | sort -rn | uniq | wc -l
65
mhale@fire:~> grep GET tcposmod.cap | wc -l 644
In other words, in the appoximately 7 minutes tcposmod was active, it made 329 connections to 65 unique destination servers and issued 644 GET requests for arbitrary files. On subsequent review, most of the files were images, javascripts, and html. There were no executables, cabs, dlls, chms, or htas downloaded, which is good. Whats NOT good is that tcposmod comes with its own additional set of files to install on the machine. These were either not part of the original mbhttpbf.exe or I was not keen enough to notice. Either case is equally likely. Putting cygwin to use, after terminating the tcposmod process I searched for the file system for anything modified or created within the past 24 hours. Here are the critical ones:
$ find . -type f -ctime -1 [snip] ./WINNT/assys.dll ./WINNT/bhwin.sys ./WINNT/ffnsys.dll ./WINNT/gstcore.dll ./WINNT/mfnsys.dll ./WINNT/rsczsys.dll ./WINNT/snsys.dll ./WINNT/system32/MSINET.OCX ./WINNT/system32/notpad.exe ./WINNT/system32/regobj.dll ./WINNT/system32/SocketX.DLL ./WINNT/system32/SocketX.OCX ./WINNT/uawin.dll
It appears tcposmod is not the only trojan bundled with munga bunga's software; it is accompanied by several dll, ocx, and a misspelled notpad.exe. No puns intended I guess, notpad.exe is really not notepad.exe. Anyway, it looks like the brute forcer to hack passwords on other machines is really just a venue for munga bunga and crew to hack your own machine. I was lucky enough to get a second option on the purpose of tcposmod from someone with BASIC reverse engineering skills. This is what he had to say:
From what i can tell, by doing some BASIC reverse engineering, it uses "msinet.ocx" to access web sites & socketX.ocx (www.mabry.com) which is a winsock type control (client/server applications). I found the socketX.ocx control in my system32 folder & I dont know where it came from...
Well, now we know for sure where socketX.ocx came from; and the facts about msinet.ocx are interesting, but not surprising. What I like about the other information he gave us is the theory on tcposmod's main function:
I think mb has created this 'tool' to access click-thru sites, that he has signed up for, to gain him hits. according to him he says that not many people download mungabunga http cracker but I think there is quite a lot! So lets say that 1000 people are infected with tcposmod and they all access his click-thru sites unknownly via tcposmod, and say there is about 20 click-thru sites in the list (i didnt count them). So that 20 * 1000 = 20000. And if all of the click-thru sites where offering 1p per hit he would get £200.00 per day!!
Of all the possible intentions, that seems like the most likely. No others seem to fit like that one does.
[1] Hackology: Trojan Warning
http://www.hackology.com/programs/mbhttpbf/trojan.shtml
Trend Micro search for “munga”
http://www.trendmicro.com/search/google/en-us/results.asp?lr=lang_en&q=munga
The AntiOnline Discussion
http://www.antionline.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=243709&highlight=TCPOSMOD
The TrojanForge Discussion
http://www.trojanforge.net/showthread/t-7454.html
The Discussion at Stormfront White Nationalist Community forum (whatever
that is) if you can read German (I can’t).
http://www.stormfront.org/threads/topic/54681-1.html
The MegaSecurity.org Advisory
http://www.megasecurity.org/trojans/m/mungabunga/Mungabunga.html
I am unable to validate much of the information here, however.
The following steps, if carried out in order, should produce the same effects as I have described in this paper.
Software & Hardware Index
1st Experiment Operating System: Windows 2000 Pro
Monitoring Software
2nd Experiment Operating System: Windows 2000 Pro
Monitoring Software
Scanning Software
Date Time Src Src_Port Dest Dest_Port 05/01/2002 20:42:52 192.168.1.102 1032 aol.com 80 05/01/2002 20:43:06 192.168.1.102 1037 www.freeiteducation.com 80 05/01/2002 20:43:20 192.168.1.102 1039 www.clickonteens.com 80 05/01/2002 20:44:13 192.168.1.102 137 www.freeiteducation.com 137 05/01/2002 20:44:34 192.168.1.102 1042 www.excite.com 80 05/01/2002 20:44:37 192.168.1.102 1044 c4.excite.com 80 05/01/2002 20:44:37 192.168.1.102 1046 docs1.excite.com 80 05/01/2002 20:44:39 192.168.1.102 1047 docs1.excite.com 80 05/01/2002 20:44:43 192.168.1.102 1049 image.imgfarm.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:00 192.168.1.102 1074 www.clickonteens.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:02 192.168.1.102 1076 bfc.excite.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:02 192.168.1.102 1078 js1.hitbox.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:02 192.168.1.102 1081 servedby.advertising.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:02 192.168.1.102 1082 js1.hitbox.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:03 192.168.1.102 1084 stats.hitbox.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:08 192.168.1.102 1086 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:09 192.168.1.102 1091 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:09 192.168.1.102 1092 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:11 192.168.1.102 1096 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:11 192.168.1.102 1097 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:11 192.168.1.102 1099 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:14 192.168.1.102 1103 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:15 192.168.1.102 1104 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:15 192.168.1.102 1105 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:15 192.168.1.102 1111 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:18 192.168.1.102 1113 p.searchmission.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:23 192.168.1.102 1116 ads.addynamix.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:23 192.168.1.102 1118 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:23 192.168.1.102 1120 view.atdmt.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:23 192.168.1.102 1122 l5.zedo.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:24 192.168.1.102 1124 c1.zedo.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:24 192.168.1.102 1127 www.searchmission.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:24 192.168.1.102 1129 ads.addynamix.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:24 192.168.1.102 1130 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:24 192.168.1.102 1132 spd.atdmt.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:25 192.168.1.102 1133 www.searchmission.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:25 192.168.1.102 1135 view.atdmt.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:25 192.168.1.102 1137 204.60.219.169 80 05/01/2002 20:45:25 192.168.1.102 1138 xads.zedo.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:25 192.168.1.102 1140 204.60.219.169 80 05/01/2002 20:45:26 192.168.1.102 1141 l5.zedo.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:28 192.168.1.102 1142 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:28 192.168.1.102 1143 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:28 192.168.1.102 1144 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:30 192.168.1.102 1149 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:32 192.168.1.102 1150 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:32 192.168.1.102 1152 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:32 192.168.1.102 1153 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:33 192.168.1.102 1159 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:45:36 192.168.1.102 1161 www.findaroo.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:41 192.168.1.102 1163 www.searchfeed.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:42 192.168.1.102 1165 us01.xmlsearch.findwhat.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:42 192.168.1.102 1167 rx.instantpills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:43 192.168.1.102 1169 www.instantpills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:53 192.168.1.102 1171 www.freeiteducation.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:55 192.168.1.102 1172 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:45:55 192.168.1.102 1176 www.freeskills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:00 192.168.1.102 1177 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:05 192.168.1.102 1179 www.revenuepilot.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:12 192.168.1.102 1188 click.revenuepilot.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:12 192.168.1.102 1190 partners.mygeek.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:12 192.168.1.102 1192 sprinks-clicks.about.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:12 192.168.1.102 1194 www.looksmart.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:13 192.168.1.102 1196 www.homecenter.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:15 192.168.1.102 1199 roi.gotoast.com 443 05/01/2002 20:46:35 192.168.1.102 1200 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:36 192.168.1.102 1201 www.freeskills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:41 192.168.1.102 1203 www.mrwordsmith.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:42 192.168.1.102 1204 www.mrwordsmith.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:50 192.168.1.102 1207 216.52.102.100 80 05/01/2002 20:46:50 192.168.1.102 1209 www.vivalasvegasvillas.com 80 05/01/2002 20:46:57 192.168.1.102 1212 www.freeskills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:01 192.168.1.102 1213 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:01 192.168.1.102 1218 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:02 192.168.1.102 1219 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:02 192.168.1.102 1221 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:03 192.168.1.100 3155 204.60.203.72 110 05/01/2002 20:47:05 192.168.1.102 1222 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:06 192.168.1.102 1224 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:06 192.168.1.102 1225 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:07 192.168.1.102 1231 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:09 192.168.1.102 1234 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:17 192.168.1.102 1250 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:17 192.168.1.102 1252 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:17 192.168.1.102 1253 m2.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:17 192.168.1.102 1255 www.supertop100.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:18 192.168.1.102 1256 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:26 192.168.1.102 1264 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:35 192.168.1.102 1265 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:35 192.168.1.102 1266 m2.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:47:35 192.168.1.102 1267 www.supertop100.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:42 192.168.1.102 1268 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:43 192.168.1.102 1272 partner.ah-ha.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:44 192.168.1.102 1274 65.58.240.161 80 05/01/2002 20:47:51 192.168.1.102 1276 www.webger.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:52 192.168.1.102 1277 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:53 192.168.1.102 1278 www.freeskills.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:57 192.168.1.102 1279 www.freeiteducation.com 80 05/01/2002 20:47:57 192.168.1.102 1280 easy4internet.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:05 192.168.1.102 1288 images.ah-ha.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:05 192.168.1.102 1290 www.easy4finance.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:24 192.168.1.102 1299 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:25 192.168.1.102 1301 www.easy4finance.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:25 192.168.1.102 1302 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:25 192.168.1.102 1307 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:28 192.168.1.102 1308 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:29 192.168.1.102 1311 www.easy4finance.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:29 192.168.1.102 1312 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:29 192.168.1.102 1313 www.sms-networks.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:29 192.168.1.102 1316 www.bidclix.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:32 192.168.1.102 1318 www.abcsearch.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:33 192.168.1.102 1319 www.abcsearch.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:33 192.168.1.102 1320 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:33 192.168.1.102 1321 m2.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:34 192.168.1.102 1323 m.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:34 192.168.1.102 1325 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:35 192.168.1.102 1327 ads.clickagents.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:36 192.168.1.102 1330 64.70.54.43 80 05/01/2002 20:48:36 192.168.1.102 1331 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:36 192.168.1.102 1332 ads.addynamix.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:36 192.168.1.102 1333 204.60.219.169 80 05/01/2002 20:48:40 192.168.1.102 1334 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:41 192.168.1.102 1335 m.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:41 192.168.1.102 1337 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:41 192.168.1.102 1339 ads.clickagents.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:42 192.168.1.102 1341 ad.doubleclick.net 80 05/01/2002 20:48:42 192.168.1.102 1342 ads.addynamix.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:42 192.168.1.102 1344 banners.pennyweb.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:46 192.168.1.102 1346 meta.7search.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:48 192.168.1.102 1348 216.21.84.32 80 05/01/2002 20:48:55 192.168.1.102 1351 www.hackology.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:56 192.168.1.102 1355 www.progenic.com 80 05/01/2002 20:48:58 192.168.1.102 1357 www.eliteprodigy.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:00 192.168.1.102 1358 www.clickonteens.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:03 192.168.1.102 1367 www.clickonteens.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:04 192.168.1.102 1368 www.clickonteens.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:11 192.168.1.102 1372 wt50.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:13 192.168.1.102 1377 62.39.85.25 80 05/01/2002 20:49:15 192.168.1.102 1379 www.wt50.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:18 192.168.1.102 1381 www.microsoft.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:20 192.168.1.102 1384 c.microsoft.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:22 192.168.1.102 1385 www.microsoft.com 80 05/01/2002 20:49:38 192.168.1.102 1392 www.custombabes.com 80
-----Original Message-----
From: MB [mailto:mb@hackology.com]
Sent: Saturday, December 06, 2003 10:34 AM
To: 'michael hale'
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
I will be looking into this properly soon, just haven't had no time to even be in front of a computer recently.
How have you been anyway?
-----Original Message-----
From: michael hale [mailto:ligh@snet.net]
Sent: Friday, 14 November 2003 6:16 AM
To: mb@hackology.com
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
Greetings, MB, it looks like we have another problem. It's been nearly 5 months since your last message stating the removal of tcposmod.exe from mbhttpbf, alas, it has either *not* been removed or has found its way back. This is not an attempt to complain on my own part, honestly I could care less - I didn't even think to check again without a boost from some recent information.
Conversations of tcposmod are showing up in forums, news boards, and the like. People want to know where this executable comes from and why. Your very experienced security contact is not keeping things very secure and the truth is going to come out sometime. I figure it is my job to warn you since I am one of the very few who actually knows the truth.
I am still in favor of keeping this a secret, yet a trojan is a trojan - harmful or not - and if you wish to retain the trust of the public you would want to realize this. I am only willing to maintain this stance of confidentiality if you are willing to respect the users who download your software, and, ultimately what gets installed on their systems as a result.
Michael
-----Original Message-----
From: MB [mailto:mb@hackology.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2003 4:27 PM
To: 'Michael Hale'
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
Michael,
Thank you for the report, after looking into it in greater detail, and escalating the issue to our security contact (who is very experienced), we have found that it does reside in the mungabunga file, and have removed it.
As we speak, a clean version of mbhttpbf is being uploaded, and we'll be trying to investigate the source of this infection. I believe someone may have gained access to our servers to distribute this Trojan.
It doesn't seem dangerous or worrisome though (the trojan that is), and we believe that you've found little documentation on it because it is not very popular at all... we suspect only a few machines would have been infected with it.
Probably just some school kids practice at programming, writing silly little annoying & somewhat pointless applications, who knows?
Once again, thank you for the report.
I do suggest that you hold the publication of the document; otherwise it would bring us unnecessary negative attention, rumours etc... And people may believe that we were the source... and if we tell them otherwise, then we'll have to publicly make known that our servers were hacked (which is really not good). I'm sure you understand.
If you would like to talk about this further, we are more then happy to.
We will also correspond with you with any further findings.
Once again, the scope of this kiddie-code doesn't really seem significant or threatening enough to publish the report and give us a bad name. When you weigh the trojans significance to the potentially bad reputation it would give us. It's a loose-loose situation.
Speak to you soon.
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Hale [mailto:ligh@snet.net]
Sent: Thursday, 19 June 2003 5:25 AM
To: mb@hackology.com
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.ex
MB,
Yes, you would most definitely have empty software logs without the
hardware to produce them.
Enclosed is a document explaining my methods, key findings, and conclusions
regarding tcposmod.exe in further detail. It should be more than enough to at
least verify tcposmod's existance within mungabunga.exe (by checking the
registry and system folders after
installation) even if you can't verify what network traffic it produces. For
this purpose I would suggest a packet sniffer such as Snort or
tcpdump.
It was prepared for myself and several others wishing to solve the mystery created by finding this software on their systems. I have not released it yet because - I would like to end it on a good note such as "Tcoposmod.exe has been sucessfully removed" so as to not correlate any trust issues with your software in the future. Better yet, maybe there is a solid explanation and/or someone responsible for inserting the executable without your knowledge.
Please continue to help resolve this.
Michael
-----Original Message-----
From: MB [mailto:mb@hackology.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2003 2:18 PM
To: 'Michael Hale'
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
>
Michael,
I installed The LinkSys LogViewer, however, it did not log anything.
I am assuming that one needs The LinkSys BEFSR41 hardware for the LinkSys LogViewer to work?
Let me know, thanks.
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Hale [mailto:ligh@snet.net]
Sent: Wednesday, 18 June 2003 11:30 AM
To: mb@hackology.com
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
MB & Friends,
Any news on this yet? It's been almost a week. As of last night, mungabunga.exe from hackology.com still contains tcposmod.exe so I am just checking up.
Michael
-----Original Message-----
From: MB [mailto:mb@hackology.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2003 11:29 PM
To: 'Michael Hale'
Subject: RE: Tcposmod.exe
Michael,
We are not aware of such a Trojan... in order for us to test your claim, please tell us what monitoring software or firewall software you are using or have used to detect this trojan... once done... we will try to replicate your findings on our end exactly as you did, so that we may find the culprit. Our traditional methods did not work.
Once again, do let us know!
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Hale [mailto:ligh@snet.net]
Sent: Thursday, 12 June 2003 8:19 AM
To: mb@hackology.com
Subject: Tcposmod.exe
MB,
I'm writing to inquire about the executable named tcposmod that accompanies mungabunga.exe (1.0.3) and adds a registry key to run at startup. During a test it initiated 144 TCP connections to port 80 of web servers around the net in about 5 minutes. It doesn't seem to do more than fill up the temporary internet files folder with random web page material.
I read your trojan warning and agree if this is what you refer to that its not harmful, just annoying. But, mungabunga was downloaded from hackology.com and no other site. Actually the link on hackology to download it leads to ns13.eb1.biz at 69.1.71.205, so I don't know if that is affiliated with you.
Well, I just wanted to know if you were aware of it and if you are: what purpose does this program serve?
Thanks,
MH
Approaching the 2 year anniversary of the first tcposmod experiment and the first trojan I ever encountered, I'd like to follow up with some final (I said that last time) details. First, on subsequent download attempts, tcposmod.exe has had differing MD5 values. To clarify things, this round of experimentation will deal with the original copy:
# md5sum tcposmod.exe 2a8647ef467286fc858d9408c17603ea tcposmod.exe
The first thing I did was load it up in PEInfo, a portable executable analyzer written by Tom Liston. I really had no idea that it was actually in PE format, but the fact that it loaded into PEInfo proved that it was. According to the Sections view, there are several sections named "BitArts," which is a packer available for quite a bit (no puns) of money from their website (www.bitarts.com). This was the first indication that it was packed with intention of staying packed - as you see later BitArts uses a patent pending algorithm to prevent reverse engineering (as opposed to UPX which is natively reversable).
The next indication was the Imports section which showed KERNEL32.DLL as being the only library called during execution of the program. For a nearly 400K program (with might I add had VERY minimal strings output), this is highly unlikely. If the majority of 400K is not Import calls, system calls to functions within those libraries, or text strings - what is it? One interesting artifact of the strings output is the alleged username of the author who packed tcposmod with BitArts: "C:\DOCUME~1\Erhan\LOCALS~1\Temp\SocketX.OCX"
Next, I loaded tcposmod into Stud_PE which is another portable executable analyzer - but with a few extra features that PEInfo lacks. I used this tool to browse for packer signatures (traces left behind by the packing utility) and it verified that tcposmod.exe had been packed with the BitArts application called Cruch.
From the vendor's web site:
Crunch enables developers of Windows software to compress a program by up to 70% and still run without any performance difference. Crunch adds a layer of anti-debug routines into your program, preventing novice crackers from viewing or tampering with your software.
I have to say, though this is probably only the 5th executable I've ever loaded into IDA Pro, BitArts' Cruch does a nice job. First, the disassembler complains that the Import table is not able to be loaded. Furthermore, the entire program file is completely uncomprehendable - it makes standard assembly routines look like a poem. Just for kicks I then loaded it into the OllyDbg debugger and it complained that the tcposmod.exe has an entry point outside of the code, as specified in it's PE header. This may indicate a self-extracting or self-modifying routine is present. OllyDbg warns that it's interpretation may be highly unreliable or simply wrong!
Maybe in another two years I'll continue the static analysis, but its pretty obvious I'm getting nowhere with it today. This is hardly a problem, it just means I'll have to do things a different way. In a VMWare environment, tcposmod will be executed in the presense of several monitoring tools including SysInternals' FileMon, RegMon, and TDIMon. RegShot will be used to make comparisons of the Windows Registry and file system before and after the program runs. Fundelete will be used to determine if anything is created, run, then deleted before the 2nd snapshot of the file system (such as a bat script or something). Network traffic will be re-directed via default gateway setting to a Red Hat Linux machine where Snort will be listening. This time DNS will not be excluded in case the program attempts some hostname lookups, too.
For consistency across tests, which may require several, I'll let it run for approximately 60 seconds.
I'll start with the RegShot output. There was a lot of activity with Keys and Values in the Registry, of course. Most are related to the configuration of MSINET.OCX and SOCKETX.OCX (described in prior experiments). What I'm more interested in now are the files it created:
C:\WINDOWS\system32\MSINET.OCX C:\WINDOWS\system32\readme-net.doc C:\WINDOWS\system32\regobj.dll C:\WINDOWS\system32\SocketX.DLL C:\WINDOWS\system32\SocketX.OCX C:\WINDOWS\tcposmod.exe
We knew about the two OCX files and the placement of tcposmod.exe is normal (note as I mentioned before the MD5 values of tcposmod varied between earlier experiments, which is probably why notpad.exe isn't created here - there is more than one variation of tcposmod out there). I'm very curious about readme-net.doc; malware doesn't usually include help documentation. Since I'll talk about this later, I'll skip it now and move onto another logfile.
In the 60 second lifespan, tcposmod utilized TCP ports 3007 through 3019 (one at a time of course) to interact with the network. Once again, since I'll discuss the purpose of this activity later, I'll skip it now (just identifying the high level details from each log).
The RegMon output is only mildy informative in this case, because we already know which Keys and Values were added to the registry. It does prove that tcposmod.exe was the responsible process though, something RegShot can't show. FileMon turned out to be the award winner as you're about to see. Here, I can see ALL of tcposmod's interaction with the filesystem, not only what remains after it's process is terminated.
Aside from what we already know, this output shows that during tcposmod's execution, winlogin.exe called CREATE with parameters of "C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe.new" and "C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache\netstat.exe.new" at 7:40:33 and 7:40:38, respectively. Further investigation shows that just before that, at 7:40:28, tcposmod called DELETE for "C:\WINDOWS\System32\netstat.exe" and completed with success. That made me grep the FileMon log for any line which included "netstat" and it gave a nice summary of what happened. Here is an abridged version:
7:40:28 tcposmod.exe:1528 READ C:\WINDOWS\System32\netstat.exe END OF FILE Offset: 30720 Length: 65024 7:40:28 tcposmod.exe:1528 DELETE C:\WINDOWS\System32\netstat.exe SUCCESS 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 OPEN C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe NOT FOUND 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 OPEN C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache\netstat.exe 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 CREATE C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe.new SUCCESS Options: OverwriteIf Sequential Access: All 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 WRITE C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe.new SUCCESS Offset: 0 Length: 30720 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 OPEN C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe SUCCESS Options: Open Access: All 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 SET INFORMATION C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe.new SUCCESS FileRenameInformation 7:40:33 winlogon.exe:640 QUERY INFORMATION C:\WINDOWS\system32\netstat.exe SUCCESS Length: 30720
Tcposmod opens the original netstat.exe, reads it to the end of file and deletes it from the file system (although the action is still fairly obvious using Fundelete, which shows netstat.exe in the trash). Then it attempts the open method again and gets a failure, which lets it know that the previous set of instructions were successful. It opens a copy of netstat.exe from the DLL cache and creates netstat.new.exe and another netstat.exe, then writes 30720 bytes of code to them. Lastly, it queries the file size and makes sure all 30720 bytes are there.
During the same time, a file named readme-net.doc was created, opened, and filled with 30720 bytes. Surely enough, it's just a backup of the new netstat:
C:\>md5sum C:\WINDOWS\System32\netstat.exe C:\WINDOWS\System32\readme-net.doc \4e1c6742ad4f55656e75d814ea6d7383 *C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\netstat.exe \4e1c6742ad4f55656e75d814ea6d7383 *C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\readme-net.doc
These executables will be examined later, but first I'll check out the final log file from our 60 second test - the network capture. From the time that it was invoked, tcposmod tried to resolve aol.com, netscape.com, yahoo.com, msn.com, and microsoft.com. I added these domains to the HOSTS file and pointed them at the Linux machine were I can netcat on port 80, expecting some web traffic. Web traffic is what I got, but interestingly enough tcposmod crashed instantaneously EVERY time. So, without name resolution it runs until manually terminated. With name resolution it crashes before sending netcat any data.
I took the chance to look up tcposmod.exe on Google and see if it was any more popular than it was in May of 2003. It turns out some AV vendors are detecting it now. Some of the better analysis are by Zone Labs and TrendMicro. Here is the output from VIrusTotal:
Code: Scan results File: tcposmod.txt Date: 04/26/2005 04:29:41 (CET) ---- AntiVir 6.30.0.7/20050425 found [BDS/DSSDoor] AVG 718/20050425 found [BackDoor.Dssdoor.A] BitDefender 7.0/20050426 found [Backdoor.Tobuf.A] ClamAV devel-20050307/20050425 found nothing DrWeb 4.32b/20050425 found [BackDoor.Tobuf] eTrust-Iris 7.1.194.0/20050425 found [Win32/Posmod!Trojan] eTrust-Vet 11.7.0.0/20050422 found [Win32.Posmod.B] Fortinet 2.51/20050426 found nothing F-Prot 3.16b/20050426 found [security risk or a "backdoor" program] Ikarus 2.32/20050425 found nothing Kaspersky 4.0.2.24/20050426 found [Backdoor.Win32.DSSdoor.a] McAfee 4476/20050425 found [BackDoor-APQ.gen] NOD32v2 1.1078/20050425 found [Win32/DSSdoor.A] Norman 5.70.10/20050420 found nothing Panda 8.02.00/20050425 found [Trj/Posmod] Sybari 7.5.1314/20050426 found [Troj/Bdoor-APQ] Symantec 8.0/20050425 found [Backdoor.Trojan]
As an anniversary present, I went back to Hackology Network where the original file was obtained, and downloaded the mbhttpbf.exe program, just to see how things had progressed in two years. It turns out the old tcposmod.exe is still packaged with the software but under the name of wintcpmod.exe. It still reports being manufactured by Microsoft, but labels itself as dss7, a new major build from dss6 - the original. The new version is much sloppier than the original - in the 60 seconds that it ran, there were over 18,000 API calls recorded by FileMon, as opposed to about 4,000 in the original. It also created 900+ new files on the system, as opposed to a mere 8 in the original.
Either we are getting better or they are getting worse. I suppose MB will still claim that his server was hacked and a script kiddie inserted this.