An attacker uses common delivery mechanisms such as email attachments or removable media to infiltrate the IDE (Integrated Development Environment) of a victim manufacturer with the intent of implanting malware allowing for attack control of the victim IDE environment. The attack then uses this access to exfiltrate sensitive data or information, manipulate said data or information, and conceal these actions. This will allow and aid the attack to meet the goal of future compromise of a recipient of the victim's manufactured product further down in the supply chain.
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CAPEC-511 (Infiltration of Software Development Environment) is a detailed-level attack pattern catalogued by MITRE in the Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC). It describes a recurring method attackers use to exploit software weaknesses.
Defenses that reduce the risk of CAPEC-511.
The attacker, knowing the victim runs email on a system adjacent to the IDE system, sends a phishing email with a malicious attachment to the victim. When viewed, the malicious attachment installs a backdoor that allows the attacker to remotely compromise the adjacent IDE system from the victim's workstation. The attacker is then able to exfiltrate sensitive data about the software being developed on the IDE system.
Using rogue versions of Xcode (Apple's app development tool) downloaded from third-party websites, it was possible for the adversary to insert malicious code into legitimate apps during the development process.
Common questions about CAPEC-511.
An attacker uses common delivery mechanisms such as email attachments or removable media to infiltrate the IDE (Integrated Development Environment) of a victim manufacturer with the intent of implanting malware allowing for attack control of the victim IDE environment. The attack then uses this access to exfiltrate sensitive data or information, manipulate said data or information, and conceal these actions. This will allow and aid the attack to meet the goal of future compromise of a recipient of the victim's manufactured product further down in the supply chain.
Avoid the common delivery mechanisms of adversaries, such as email attachments, which could introduce the malware.
MITRE rates CAPEC-511 as High severity with low likelihood of attack.
Attack-pattern data is sourced from the MITRE CAPEC catalog (v3.9). Weakness associations link to the corresponding CWE entries on RadicalNotion.AI.
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