Quick Malware Analysis: PIKABOT INFECTION WITH COBALT STRIKE pcap from 2023-05-23

Thanks to Brad Duncan for sharing this pcap:
https://www.malware-traffic-analysis.net/2023/05/23/index.html

We did a quick analysis of this pcap on the NEW Security Onion 2.4. If you'd like to follow along, you can do the following:

• install Security Onion 2.4 in a VM:
  https://docs.securityonion.net/en/2.4/first-time-users.html
• import the pcap using so-import-pcap:
  https://docs.securityonion.net/en/2.4/so-import-pcap.html#so-import-pcap
• optionally enable the new DNS lookups feature:
  https://docs.securityonion.net/en/2.4/soc-customization.html?#reverse-dns-lookups

The screenshots at the bottom of this post show some of the interesting alerts, metadata logs, and session transcripts. Want more practice? Check out our other Quick Malware Analysis posts at:
https://blog.securityonion.net/search/label/quick%20malware%20analysis

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Screenshots

First, we start with the overview of all alerts and logs:

Next, we focus on the alerts:

We can switch to ungrouped mode to see more detail:

Notice that the last 4 alerts are for the same TCP stream, so let's pivot to pcap. Notice the user agent string, the bare IP host header, and the executable file that is downloaded:

Back at the alerts, let's take a look at the pcap for the 3 "ET CNC Feodo Tracker Reported CnC Server" alerts:

After reviewing alerts, let's look at all of the protocol metadata:

Next, let's look at the Zeek Notices:

We'll next review HTTP transactions:

Next, here are the SSL/TLS connections:

We'll next review the DNS lookups:

That sankey diagram is a little crowded, so let's maximize it:

Finally, let's look at all connections:

and in maximized format: