The Breach from Next Door. How Russian APT Exploited Wi-Fi to Infiltrate Their Target

Cybersecurity

Nov 25

How do attackers breach a secure organization without stepping foot inside? In the Nearest Neighbor Attack, the Russian APT group Fancy Bear(also known as APT28) [2] executed a sophisticated cyber-espionage campaign, exploiting weak Wi-Fi security and nearby organizations to infiltrate their ultimate target.

This wasn’t just a typical hacking attempt—it was a carefully planned operation. The attackers:

Stole credentials using password-spraying.
Exploited Wi-Fi networks that lacked multi-factor authentication (MFA).
Leveraged systems in neighboring organizations to bypass physical distance.
Extracted sensitive data while leaving minimal traces.

Here’s a high-level overview of the attack path:

Now, let's break down the attack path [1].

1. Initial Recon and Credential Harvesting

Objective: Gain access credentials to Organization A's network.
Method:

Conducted password-spraying attacks on public-facing services of Organization A.
Successfully brute-forced several valid username-password combinations.
Public-facing services were protected by multi-factor authentication (MFA), which prevented immediate use of these credentials.

2. Exploiting Wi-Fi Network Vulnerabilities

Gap Exploited: Organization A's enterprise Wi-Fi network required only a valid domain username and password for access, without MFA.
Challenge for Attackers: The attackers were geographically distant and could not directly connect to Organization A’s Wi-Fi.

3. Compromising Neighboring Organizations

Strategy:

Identified and targeted nearby organizations (Organization B, Organization C) geographically close to Organization A.
Breached these organizations through:

Exploiting vulnerable public-facing services.
Using compromised credentials obtained via brute force or phishing.

Focused on finding dual-homed systems—devices connected to both wired and Wi-Fi networks.

4. Leveraging Dual-Homed Systems

Execution:

Attackers gained control of a dual-homed system within Organization B.
Used its Wi-Fi adapter to connect to Organization A's Wi-Fi network, leveraging previously brute-forced credentials.
Bypassed physical proximity limitations by daisy-chaining through compromised neighboring networks.

5. Gaining Access to Organization A's Network

Connection Established: Successfully authenticated into Organization A's Wi-Fi network.
Network Penetration:

Gained access to the internal network.
Began reconnaissance to locate sensitive data.

6. Privilege Escalation

Zero-Day Exploitation: Used a privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2022-38028) in the Microsoft Windows Print Spooler.
Persistence Established:

Deployed tools like servtask.bat to dump sensitive registry hives (SAM, SECURITY, and SYSTEM).
Used PowerShell scripts to compress and stage data for exfiltration.

7. Lateral Movement and Data Exfiltration

Objective: Access sensitive Ukraine-related projects and data.
Techniques:

Moved laterally across systems to identify valuable data.
Used living-off-the-land tools to avoid detection (e.g., netsh for port-forwarding, vssadmin for creating shadow copies).
Exfiltrated data via:

SMB connections.
Staging data on public-facing systems for external download.

8. Anti-Forensic Measures

Covering Tracks:

Used Windows utility Cipher.exe to securely delete files.
Removed all artifacts related to tools and scripts after use.
Minimal malware deployment to evade endpoint detection.

9. Further Intrusions via Guest Wi-Fi

Post-Detection Activity: After initial remediation by Organization A, attackers pivoted to the guest Wi-Fi network.
Exploit: Poor segmentation allowed access to internal systems from the guest network.
Reinfiltration: Attackers regained access to sensitive data before being detected again.

Citation

1. Koessel, S., Adair, S., & Lancaster, T. (2024, November 22). The nearest neighbor attack: How a Russian APT weaponized nearby Wi-Fi networks for covert access. Volexity. https://www.volexity.com/blog/2024/11/22/the-nearest-neighbor-attack-how-a-russian-apt-weaponized-nearby-wi-fi-networks-for-covert-access/

2. CrowdStrike. (2019, February 12). Who is FANCY BEAR (APT28)? CrowdStrike. https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/who-is-fancy-bear/

Emilia Mancilla