[BreachExchange] Security Notification for CCleaner v5.33.6162 and CCleaner Cloud v1.07.3191 for 32-bit Windows users

[Inga Goddijn]

https://www.piriform.com/news/blog/2017/9/18/security-notification-for-ccleaner-v5336162-and-ccleaner-cloud-v1073191-for-32-bit-windows-users

Dear CCleaner customers, users and supporters,

We would like to apologize for a security incident that we have recently
found in CCleaner version 5.33.6162 and CCleaner Cloud version 1.07.3191. A
suspicious activity was identified on September 12th, 2017, where we saw an
unknown IP address receiving data from software found in version 5.33.6162
of CCleaner, and CCleaner Cloud version 1.07.3191, on 32-bit Windows
systems. Based on further analysis, we found that the 5.33.6162 version of
CCleaner and the 1.07.3191 version of CCleaner Cloud was illegally modified
before it was released to the public, and we started an investigation
process. We also immediately contacted law enforcement units and worked
with them on resolving the issue. Before delving into the technical
details, let me say that the threat has now been resolved in the sense that
the rogue server is down, other potential servers are out of the control of
the attacker, and we’re moving all existing CCleaner v5.33.6162 users to
the latest version. Users of CCleaner Cloud version 1.07.3191 have received
an automatic update. In other words, to the best of our knowledge, we were
able to disarm the threat before it was able to do any harm.

Technical description
An unauthorized modification of the CCleaner.exe binary resulted in an
insertion of a two-stage backdoor capable of running code received from a
remote IP address on affected systems.

The suspicious code was hidden in the application’s initialization code
called CRT (Common Runtime) that is normally inserted during compilation by
the compiler. This code modification was executed by the following function
calls (functions marked by red represent the CRT modifications):



This modification performed the following actions before the main
application’s code:

   - It decrypted and unpacked hardcoded shellcode (10 kB large) - simple
   XOR-based cipher was used for this.
   - The result (16 kB in size) was a DLL (dynamic link library) with a
   missing MZ header.
   - This DLL was subsequently loaded and executed in an independent thread.
   - Afterwards, a normal execution of CRT code and main CCleaner
   continued, resulting in the thread with payload running in the background.

Illustration of patched CRT code (see the added call to a
payload-decryption routine in the modified version):

The code executed within that thread was heavily obfuscated to make its
analysis harder (encrypted strings, indirect API calls, etc.). The
suspicious code was performing the following actions:

   - It stored certain information in the Windows registry key
   HKLM\SOFTWARE\Piriform\Agomo:
      - MUID: randomly generated number identifying a particular system.
      Possibly also to be used as communication encryption key.
      - TCID: timer value used for checking whether to perform certain
      actions (communication, etc.)
      - NID: IP address of secondary CnC server
   - Besides that, it collected the following information about the local
   system:
      - Name of the computer
      - List of installed software, including Windows updates
      - List of running processes
      - MAC addresses of first three network adapters
      - Additional information whether the process is running with
      administrator privileges, whether it is a 64-bit system, etc.
   - All of the collected information was encrypted and encoded by base64
   with a custom alphabet.
   - The encoded information was subsequently submitted to an external IP
   address 216.126.x.x (this address was hardcoded in the payload, and we have
   intentionally masked its last two octets here) via a HTTPS POST request.
   There was also a [fake] reference to “Host: speccy.piriform.com” in
   communication.
   - The code then read a reply from the same IP address, providing it with
   the functionality to download a second stage payload from the
   aforementioned IP address. The second stage payload is received as a custom
   base64-encoded string, further encrypted by the same xor-based encryption
   algorithm as all the strings in the first stage code. We have not detected
   an execution of the second stage payload and believe that its activation is
   highly unlikely.
   - In case the IP address becomes unreachable, a backup in the form of
   DGA (domain name generator) activates and is used to redirect communication
   to a different location. Fortunately, these generated domains are not under
   the control of the attacker and do not pose any risk.

At this stage, we don’t want to speculate how the unauthorized code
appeared in the CCleaner software, where the attack originated from, how
long it was being prepared and who stood behind it. The investigation is
still ongoing. We want to thank the Avast Threat Labs for their help and
assistance with this analysis.

Again, we would like to apologize for any inconvenience this incident could
have caused to our clients; we are taking detailed steps internally so that
this does not happen again, and to ensure your security while using any of
our Piriform products. Users of our cloud version have received an
automated update. For all other users, if you have not already done so, we
encourage you to update your CCleaner software to version 5.34 or higher,
the latest version is available for download here
<https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/standard>.
<https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/standard>
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