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S0578 SUPERNOVA

SUPERNOVA is an in-memory web shell written in .NET C#. It was discovered in November 2020 during the investigation of APT29’s SolarWinds cyber operation but determined to be unrelated. Subsequent analysis suggests SUPERNOVA may have been used by the China-based threat group SPIRAL.35412

Item Value
ID S0578
Associated Names
Type MALWARE
Version 1.1
Created 18 February 2021
Last Modified 10 April 2024
Navigation Layer View In ATT&CK® Navigator

Techniques Used

Domain ID Name Use
enterprise T1071 Application Layer Protocol -
enterprise T1071.001 Web Protocols SUPERNOVA had to receive an HTTP GET request containing a specific set of parameters in order to execute.35
enterprise T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution SUPERNOVA was installed via exploitation of a SolarWinds Orion API authentication bypass vulnerability (CVE-2020-10148).67
enterprise T1036 Masquerading -
enterprise T1036.005 Match Legitimate Resource Name or Location SUPERNOVA has masqueraded as a legitimate SolarWinds DLL.35
enterprise T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information -
enterprise T1027.013 Encrypted/Encoded File SUPERNOVA contained Base64-encoded strings.1
enterprise T1505 Server Software Component -
enterprise T1505.003 Web Shell SUPERNOVA is a Web shell.531

References

  1. CISA. (2021, January 27). Malware Analysis Report (AR21-027A). Retrieved February 22, 2021. ↩↩↩

  2. MSTIC. (2020, December 18). Analyzing Solorigate, the compromised DLL file that started a sophisticated cyberattack, and how Microsoft Defender helps protect customers . Retrieved January 5, 2021. ↩

  3. Riley, W. (2020, December 1). SUPERNOVA SolarWinds .NET Webshell Analysis. Retrieved February 18, 2021. ↩↩↩↩

  4. SolarWinds. (2020, December 24). SolarWinds Security Advisory. Retrieved February 22, 2021. ↩

  5. Tennis, M. (2020, December 17). SUPERNOVA: A Novel .NET Webshell. Retrieved February 22, 2021. ↩↩↩↩

  6. Carnegie Mellon University. (2020, December 26). SolarWinds Orion API authentication bypass allows remote command execution. Retrieved February 22, 2021. ↩

  7. Stoner, J. (2021, January 21). Detecting Supernova Malware: SolarWinds Continued. Retrieved February 22, 2021. ↩