Hackers Use Cloud Services for Hidden Mining Cryptocurrency

The company Skybox Security conducted a study, according to the results of which hackers switched from miner viruses for PCs of ordinary users to hacking and the use of cloud services.

“The use of miner viruses has noticeably decreased and now occupies only 15% of the total number of attacks. But the cases of the use of ransomware, botnets and backdoors have become more frequent. The number of vulnerabilities in cloud containers increased by 46% compared with 2018 and 240% compared with 2017, ”noted computer security experts.

Cloud services, which are usually provided by large companies like Google and Amazon, are becoming a popular vector for attack. Clients’ servers are often left unattended, while their capacities allow to extract a large number of coins. Hackers can instantly copy containers, using even more power, which translates into huge accounts for customer services.

“Cloud technologies are developing very quickly, so it is not surprising that the number of vulnerabilities in these services is also growing. After the discovery of such a vulnerability, developers should eliminate it very quickly, because if it is used for a successful attack, this will entail significant consequences. Infected containers can be produced very quickly and the number of victims of the attack will grow exponentially, ”said Skybox Security spokeswoman Marina Kidron.

At the same time, Skybox Security believes that the number of vulnerabilities will increase and after a while “they will flood the companies”: “During the first half of 2019, 7,000 vulnerabilities were discovered, and this is more than in the whole of 2017,” the company representatives said.

Recall that in June of this year it became known about hacking more than 50,000 servers worldwide. It was reported that the servers were infected with malware for hidden mining cryptocurrency.