F5 Labs, in conjunction with our partner Baffin Bay Networks, set out to research global attack traffic by geographic region to gain a deeper understanding of the cyberthreat landscape. Aside from attack campaigns targeting the entire Internet (the IPv4 address space), the attack landscape varies regionally in terms of sources, targets, and attack types. In addition, targeted ports expose regional differences in IT norms. This can be seen when it comes to the way nonstandard ports are used for different services such as HTTP and SSH. In this latest data collection, we looked at malicious traffic over the same 90-day period in the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Europe, Russia, Asia, Australia, and the Middle East. (Note, for purposes of this research series, the Middle East includes Turkey, and excludes Middle Eastern countries that U.S. companies are not authorized to operate in.) This article covers attack traffic destined for systems in the Middle East from August 1, 2019 through October 31, 2019.
The number one source of attacks targeting systems in the Middle Eastern came from IP addresses assigned to Russia, which launched more malicious traffic to the region than IP addresses assigned to the Netherlands, in second position. The Middle East was the most popular target of attacks sourced from Russian IP addresses.
The top four IP addresses launching attacks against systems in the Middle East were assigned to Russia. These were abusive scans, largely looking for vulnerabilities on multiple ports. These IP addresses were not seen attacking other regions in the same time period.
Rounding out the top 10 attacking IP addresses were those assigned to the Netherlands, Romania, and Moldova. These 10 IP addresses launched attacks on RFB/VNC1 port 5900, hitting all regions of the world.
Of the top targeted ports, two were port 8291, used by MikroTik routers, and port 7547, used by Internet service providers (ISPs) to remotely manage their small office/home office (SOHO) router infrastructure. Combined, these ports received 3.7 million attacks. This activity is directly tied to the building of IoT botnets, also known as thingbots.
The top ports targeted in the Middle East followed similar patterns as the rest of the world, with SMB port 445 as the top attacked port followed by SSH port 22, VNC port 5900, and HTTP port 80. Looking past the top 7 attacked services, the Middle East is the only region to see targeted malicious traffic directed at ports 81 (used for HTTP), 53 (used for DNS), and 8545 (used by Ethereum clients).
In addition to the most frequently attacked ports, the Middle East was one of two regions to receive malicious traffic against Microsoft SQL server on port 1433, indicating databases, along with IoT devices, were a top target in that region.
Top Source Traffic Countries
Before we look at the “top source traffic countries,” let’s clarify that we’re talking about the geographical source of IP addresses. The “top source traffic countries” does not mean that the country itself, individuals, or organizations based in that country were responsible for the malicious traffic. The attack traffic could have gone through a proxy server or compromised system or IoT device with IP addresses assigned in a particular country. For expediency, we refer to these as “top source traffic countries.”
IP addresses assigned to Russia launched the most malicious traffic against systems in the Middle East from August 1, 2019, through October 31, 2019. The top 10 source traffic countries during this period were:
Russia
Netherlands
United States
China
Italy
France
Turkey
Moldova
Germany
South Korea
The top 10 were also the top source traffic countries globally.
Figure 1. Source traffic countries launching attack traffic against targets in the Middle East, August through October 2019
IP addresses assigned in Russia launched 4 times the amount of attack traffic against systems in the Middle East than those registered in the Netherlands. Both the Netherlands and Russia are on the list for the top source traffic countries globally. These IP addresses launched nearly 11 times more malicious traffic directed toward the Middle East than they did toward the U.S., the second most targeted by these IP addresses. France, one of the top 3 source countries attacking other regions, is noticeably further down the list (at position 6). The Middle East also received a considerable amount of traffic from IP addresses assigned in Romania (position 11) and in Ukraine (position 13). The Middle East is one of two regions to receive malicious traffic from Romania, the other being Russia. In regard to the Ukraine, malicious traffic attributed to IP addresses assigned in Ukraine only targeted three regions: Russia, Europe, and the Middle East. Other than two IP addresses assigned in Ukraine that together launched a normalized 372,000 attacks, accounting for about one third of total traffic attributed to IP addresses assigned in Ukraine, no other IP addresses in Ukraine or Romania show up in the top attacking IP address list, discussed later. This indicates that attacks coming from IP addresses in those countries were more distributed; that is, they were launched from many IP addresses but had a low number of attacks per address. This type of activity is deliberate and takes more resources (systems and manpower) to pull off, and therefore is typically attributed to more sophisticated threat actors.
Note: The “normalized” attack count is not the total attack count collected, it is a calculated number considering the number of attack collection sensors region to region. We use normalized attack data in these reports in order to accurately compare attack data between regions and ensure that no one region is overrepresented in the total data analysis.
The Middle East is the only region to receive malicious traffic attributed to source IP addresses assigned in Spain. This only accounts for 1.6% of all malicious traffic August through October 2019.
Figure 2. Top 20 source traffic countries (on a normalized scale) of attacks targeting systems in the Middle East, August through October 2019
Because IP addresses assigned to Russia launched so many attacks against systems in the Middle East during this period, we wanted to show a comparison of malicious traffic sourced from IP addresses in Russia directed to all regions analyzed around the world.
Figure 3. Normalized count of attack sourced from IP addresses assigned in Russia by geographical target, August through October 2019
Top Attacking Organizations (ASNs)
Petersburg Internet Network from Russia launched nearly double the attack traffic against systems in the Middle East than hosting provider Selectel (from the Netherlands), which was in second place. SS-Net in third position and MAROSNET Telecommunication Company LLC, in fourth position, are Russian. DigitalOcean, in sixth position, did not have any IP addresses show up on the top 50 attacking IP addresses list, which means the attacks were more evenly distributed across systems.
Figure 4. Source ASNs of attacks targeting Middle Eastern systems, August through October 2019
The following table lists ASNs and their associated organizations (note that some have multiple ASNs).
AS Organization
ASN
Normalized Count
Petersburg Internet Network ltd.
44050
7,007,052.50
Selectel
49505
4,294,692.00
SS-Net
204428
3,358,399.40
Marosnet Telecommunication Company LLC
48666
2,673,245.80
IP Volume Inc
202425
2,509,987.40
Digital Ocean LLC
14061
1,847,636.20
RM Engineering LLC
49877
1,539,218.70
China Telecom
4134
1,397,017.60
Eurobet Italia SRL
200944
1,385,536.10
OVH SAS
16276
1,273,846.40
GTECH S.p.A.
35574
1,041,995.50
Donner Oleg Alexeevich
35606
880,958.10
IP CHistyakov Mihail Viktorovich
35582
760,214.70
Amazon.com, Inc.
16509
632,401.90
IMAQLIQ SERVICE Ltd
12555
722,226.90
Garanti Bilisim Teknolojisi ve Ticaret T.A.S.
12903
678,935.70
Vitox Telecom
209299
645,652.90
Korea Telecom
4766
642,071.10
Data Communication Business Group
3462
632,553.00
SoftLayer Technologies Inc.
36351
595,028.20
Internet-Cosmos LLC
34300
588,531.50
Hetzner Online GmbH
24940
572,179.90
Hosting technology LTD
48282
567,631.60
Hostkey B.v.
57043
549,825.90
Dianet Ltd.
43314
527,897.80
Teleline Ltd.
13016
525,814.40
VNPT Corp
45899
520,675.70
PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia
7713
454,833.80
Contabo GmbH
51167
422,825.10
Online S.a.s.
12876
420,159.30
China Unicom
4837
416,594.10
NETSEC
45753
414,159.60
SK Broadband Co Ltd
9318
394,738.90
Serverius Holding B.V.
50673
375,209.20
PE Taran Marina Vasil'evna
51743
372,027.50
Chernyshov Aleksandr Aleksandrovich
202984
371,658.90
Turk Telekom
47331
238,842.50
UGB Hosting OU
206485
306,819.60
China Unicom IP network
133119
287,601.30
JSC ER-Telecom Holding
41786
266,715.80
Rostelecom
12389
210,051.20
Linode, LLC
63949
228,179.50
CariNet, Inc.
10439
201,691.90
Melita Limited
200805
200,896.40
Viettel Group
7552
197,330.10
TS-NET of TOSET, Inc. in Japan
55902
195,257.10
LeaseWeb Netherlands B.V.
60781
193,883.40
Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group
135905
188,628.80
CANTV Servicios, Venezuela
8048
187,967.50
TELEFÔNICA BRASIL S.A
27699
99,004.70
ASNs Attacking the Middle East Compared to Other Regions
We looked at the count of attacks by ASN toward Middle Eastern systems and compared that to other regions of the world. The key difference between attack traffic launched from networks targeting the Middle East versus the rest of the world is the volume of attacks launched from the top 4 networks targeting Middle Eastern systems—Petersburg Internet Network, Selectel, SS-Net, and MAROSNET Telecommunication Company LLC, (three Russian, one Dutch)—and the rest of the world receiving little to no attacks from the same networks. In contrast, top attacking networks in other regions like OVH SAS (France) and RM Engineering (Moldova) sent much less traffic toward Middle Eastern systems.
Top Attacking IP Addresses
The top 4 IP addresses attacking systems in the Middle East from August 1, 2019 through October 31, 2019 were all assigned in Russia and were engaged in either credential stuffing or in multi-port scanning, activities typically attributed to looking for vulnerabilities. Seventy-four percent of the IP addresses on the top 50 attacking IP addresses list engaged in the same multi-port scanning behavior, most of which are Russian.1 For a complete list of attacks by IP address, see section Attacks Types of Top Attacking IP Addresses.
Figure 5. Top 50 IP addresses attacking Middle East targets, August through October 2019
IP Addresses Attacking the Middle East Compared to Other Regions
We looked at the volume of attack traffic Middle Eastern systems received per IP address and compared that to other regions of the world. Attack traffic destined for Middle Eastern systems had little overlap with the rest of the world except for a handful of IP addresses launching global attacks against RFB/VNC port 5900 (see the next section). Eighty percent of the top attacking IP addresses sending malicious traffic to the middle east were unique to the Middle East region, 16% of that top 50 were seen sending malicious attack traffic to all other regions in the world, and the remaining 4% were seen targeting 7/8 of the regions we looked at.
Attack Types of Top Attacking IP Addresses
Of the top 50 IP addresses attacking systems in the Middle East, most were Russian (64%). These IP addresses along with the remainder coming from the Netherlands (4%), Romania (4%), Moldova (6%), France (8%), Spain (2%), Germany (6%), Italy (2%), France (8%), and Ukraine (4%) are launching scans against multiple ports (49%), targeting port 80 and 8080 with HTTP attacks (5%), and targeting Remote Frame Buffer (RFB)/VNC port 5900 with brute force and credential stuffing attacks (19%).
The IP addresses in Moldova assigned to RM Engineering, as well as OVH SAS in France, were launching brute force and credential stuffing attacks against Remote Frame Buffer (RFB)/VNC port 5900, globally. All regions of the world are being hit with these same attacks from the following IP addresses:
185.153.197.251
185.153.198.197
46.105.144.48
193.188.22.114
185.156.177.44
185.153.196.159
5.39.39.49
185.40.13.3
These port 5900 attacks were new activity we noticed earlier in the summer and continued through October 31, 2019. We are conducting an investigation and will be looking to share our findings publicly on Twitter.
Eighty percent of the IP addresses seen sending malicious traffic to the Middle East exclusively targeted this region. The following list is in descending order starting with top attacking IP addresses.
Source IP Address
ASN Organization
Country
Normalized Attack Count
Attacks Known For
31.184.196.195
Petersburg Internet Network
Russia
1,830,560.5
Multi-port scanning
31.184.197.195
Petersburg Internet Network
Russia
1,743,359.4
Multi-port scanning
31.184.196.199
Petersburg Internet Network
Russia
1,713,624.0
Multi-port scanning
31.184.197.199
Petersburg Internet Network
Russia
1,709,400.9
Multi-port scanning
185.143.221.104
Selectel
Netherlands
1,205,687.1
Multi-port scanning
80.82.78.104
IP Volume inc
Netherlands
929,167.6
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.250
SS-Net
Russia
922,830.2
Multi-port scanning
92.118.37.97
Donner Oleg Alexeevich
Romania
563,369.5
Multi-port scanning
185.153.197.251
RM Engineering LLC
Moldova
557,115.2
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.6
SS-Net
Russia
544,818.3
Multi-port scanning
93.189.222.80
DIANET Ltd.
Russia
527,462.7
Credential stuffing and HTTP attacks
93.189.249.109
Teleline Ltd.
Russia
525,814.4
Credential stuffing, multi-port scanning, and HTTP attacks
185.153.198.197
RM Engineering
Moldova
503,611.6
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
92.119.160.90
Selectel
Russia
474,398.1
Multi-port scanning
185.58.204.69
Marosnet Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
454,153.3
Multi-port scanning
185.58.206.51
Marosnet Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
453,857.1
Multi-port scanning
185.58.206.15
Marosnet Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
389,440.9
Multi-port scanning
185.87.48.104
Marosnet Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
384,468.3
Multi-port scanning
93.189.147.162
IMAQLIQ SERVICE Ltd
Russia
374,878.9
Credential stuffing, multi-port scanning, and HTTP attacks
92.119.160.251
Selectel
Russia
356,754.9
Multi-port scanning
92.119.160.250
Selectel
Russia
347,531.5
Multi-port scanning
93.189.144.135
IMAQLIQ SERVICE Ltd
Russia
347,236.6
Credential stuffing, multi-port scanning, and HTTP attacks
93.189.204.162
JSC ER-Telecom Holding
Russia
256,840.9
Credential stuffing, multi-port scanning, and HTTP attacks
185.254.122.50
UGB Hosting OU
Russia
224,907.5
Multi-port scanning
185.153.196.159
RM Engineering LLC
Republic of Moldova
212,839.1
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
46.105.144.48
OVH SAS
France
202,142.7
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
185.176.27.246
SS-Net
Russia
198,532.4
Multi-port scanning
51.75.32.149
OVH SAS
France
198,274.3
Multi-port scanning
185.40.13.3
GTECH S.p.A.
Italy
192,255.5
Multi-port scanning
194.67.207.25
MAROSNET Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
190,066.7
Multi-port scanning
62.210.220.217
Online S.a.s.
France
186,914.8
Multi-port scanning
91.217.254.37
PE Taran Marina Vasil'evna
Ukraine
186,263.8
Multi-port scanning
91.217.254.167
PE Taran Marina Vasil'evna
Ukraine
185,763.6
Multi-port scanning
5.39.39.49
OVH SAS
France
184,431.2
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
148.251.20.137
Hetzner Online GmbH
Germany
176,001.6
Multi-port scanning
148.251.20.134
Hetzner Online GmbH
Germany
175,726.6
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.166
SS-Net
Russia
175,511.8
Multi-port scanning
194.67.202.109
MAROSNET Telecommunication Company LLC
Russia
172,302.0
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.186
SS-Net
Russia
170,891.8
Multi-port scanning
185.175.93.105
IP CHistyakov Mihail Viktorovich
Spain
170,151.3
Multi-port scanning
92.118.37.86
Donner Oleg Alexeevich
Romania
169,713.6
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.18
SS-Net
Russia
166,207.1
Multi-port scanning
62.173.145.112
Internet-Cosmos LLC
Russia
156,611.4
Multi-port scanning
62.173.139.141
Internet-Cosmos LLC
Russia
155,513.1
Multi-port scanning
62.173.149.167
Internet-Cosmos LLC
Russia
155,443.9
Multi-port scanning
185.176.27.42
SS-Net
Russia
152,556.9
Multi-port scanning
92.119.160.52
Selectel
Russia
145,908.0
Multi-port scanning
213.136.90.36
Contabo GmbH
Germany
143,881.3
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
193.188.22.114
Hostkey B.v.
Russia
142,707.9
Credential stuffing and multi-port scanning
Top Targeted Ports
Looking at the destination ports of the attacks helps us understanding what types of systems and services attackers are looking for. Microsoft SMB port 445 was the number one attacked port in the Middle East by a large margin. In a distant second was SSH port 22. Both of these ports are commonly targeted as exploiting a vulnerability, and either port can give a malicious actor access to the entire system. The third most attacked port, VNC 5900, was being attacked all over the world during this time period. This activity is not typical, hence the investigative threat hunting we are doing on Twitter mentioned previously.
What stands out the most in top attacked ports in the Middle East is the targeting of DNS port 53. That port does not show up in any other region we analyzed during the same time period.
In addition to some of the most commonly targeted ports, the number of non-standard HTTP ports (81, 8443, and 8080) and other application ports like Microsoft SMB port 445, and Microsoft CRM port 5555 makes it clear that attackers are targeting applications in the Middle East.
Also noteworthy is the apparent attempt to compromise IoT systems in the Middle East by targeting ports 7547 and 8291, both of which are only used by SOHO routers and are commonly attacked by IoT botnets (thingbots). We called out these ports in our 2017 report, The Hunt for IoT: The Rise of Thingbots.
Figure 6. Top 20 ports attacked in the Middle East, August through October 2019
Conclusion
In general, the best approach a security team can take as defenders in this modern threat landscape is one of “assume breach.” This is not a FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) position; rather, it’s a realistic position backed by the volume of attack traffic received by all Internet-connected systems, the likelihood of vulnerabilities existing, and the amount of compromised credentials available to attackers. When you take an “assume breach” defensive position, you are collecting attack traffic and monitoring your logs. You can use this high-level attack data to compare against the attack traffic directly hitting your own network. This will help you rule out run-of-the-mill attack traffic, or help you determine whether or not you are being targeted, in which case, investigating the attack sources and patterns is a worthwhile activity.
Additionally, locking down any of the top targeted ports that do not absolutely require unfettered internet access should be completed as soon as possible.
And because default vendor credentials are commonly left in place, and the volume of breached credentials in 2017 was enough to determine that many usernames and passwords are now considered “public,” all organizations should have credential stuffing protection in place. See F5 Labs report Lessons Learned from a Decade of Data Breaches for more data on these breached passwords. Particularly for any system with remote authentication, and especially administrative remote access.
Security Controls
To mitigate the types of attacks discussed here, we recommend the following security controls be put in place:
Technical
Preventative
Use firewalls to restrict all unnecessary access to commonly attacked ports that must be exposed publicly.
Never expose internal databases publicly, and restrict access to internal data on a need-to-know basis.
Prioritize risk mitigation for commonly attacked ports that require external access (like HTTP and SSH) for vulnerability management.
Protect applications accessible over SSH using brute force restrictions.
Disable all vendor default credentials (commonly used in SSH brute force attacks) on all systems before deploying them publicly.
Administrative
Preventative
Implement geo IP address blocking of commonly attacking countries that your organization does not need to communicate with.
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Remi Cohen was a Threat Research Evangelist with F5 Labs. Prior to F5 she worked for a large national laboratory conducting vulnerability assessments, and research on current threats as well as an civilian analyst for the US Department of Defense. Her specialty areas of research include mobile vulnerabilities, Industrial Control Systems, and Eastern European threats. She is an associate of (ISC)2 by passing the CISSP exam and is certified in both COMPTIA Security+ and ECCouncil C|EH. She holds a Master’s degree from New Mexico State University in Industrial Engineering as well as Bachelor’s degrees in Computer Science and Government from Georgetown University.
Sara Boddy was a Senior Director overseeing F5 Labs and Communities. She came to F5 from Demand Media where she was the Vice President of Information Security and Business Intelligence. Sara ran the security team at Demand Media for 6 years; prior to Demand Media, she held various roles in the information security community over 11 years at Network Computing Architects and Conjungi Networks.
1 Remote Frame Buffer (RFB) is the protocol used for Virtual Network Computing (VNC), a graphical desktop sharing system that enables the remote control of another computer.
2 Note here that some of the top 50 IP addresses were engaged in multiple types of malicious behavior that included port scanning and credential stuffing. It is possible for an IP to be involved in more than one type of behavior.
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