The Department of Homeland Security and FBI issued a report on Thursday warning that North Korea continues its aggressive campaign of cyberattacks, including malware directed at computer systems in the United States, despite the diplomatic opening that culminated in Tuesday’s historic summit between President Donald Trump and dictator Kim Jong-un.
The malware analysis report focuses on a virus called TYPEFRAME, which has been identified as a product of the North Korean government’s “Hidden Cobra” hacking brigade. Variants of TYPEFRAME can be delivered by executable programs, launched from websites or email attachments, and infected Microsoft Word documents.
The Washington Times reports federal cybersecurity specialists determined that TYPEFRAME is capable of “forging connections between compromised computers and command-and-control servers operated by North Korean hackers, in turn allowing the attackers to install additional malware on machines after they become infected.”
The North Korean government has been accused of using similar Trojan malware to penetrate computer systems in 15 different countries on previous occasions. North Korea was also accused of spreading the infamous WannaCry ransomware virus in 2017 and hacking Sony in 2014 to avenge a movie that insulted Kim Jong-un.
TYPEFRAME is considered aggressive and somewhat difficult to remove by security experts. If you suspect your computer has been infected, instructions for cleansing the virus can be found here.
“A spokesperson for the White House National Security Council declined to comment on whether Trump and Kim discussed cybersecurity during their meeting,” Cyberscoop reported on Thursday.
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