⚠️ Overview

Ecipekac is a ransomware family first documented in mid‑2021 by Trend Micro researchers, operated by a financially motivated threat group tracked as TA‑271. It belongs to the Ransomware‑as‑a‑Service category and primarily targets enterprise environments running Windows and VMware ESXi hypervisors.

🔧 Technical Capabilities

Ecipekac propagates through RDP brute‑force attacks, exploitation of vulnerable VPN appliances (e.g., Pulse Secure CVE‑2019‑11510), and phishing emails containing malicious macros. It uses a custom packer to obfuscate its payload and employs intermittent encryption to speed up file encryption, leaving large portions of files readable but corrupting critical headers. Persistence is achieved via scheduled tasks and registry run keys, while command‑and‑control (C2) communication uses the Tor network over SOCKS5 proxies to evade network detection. The malware incorporates anti‑analysis techniques such as VM‑awareness checks and process hollowing to bypass security products. It also drops a ransom note named !Ecipekac_README.txt containing payment instructions and a unique victim ID.

📜 History & Notable Incidents

Ecipekac first appeared in June 2021, with a major campaign against manufacturing and healthcare firms in Southeast Asia. In October 2021, an incident affecting a Japanese automotive parts supplier resulted in production downtime and a reported ransom demand of $5 million. Researchers at MITRE have mapped Ecipekac’s tactics to ATT&CK IDs T1486 (Data Encrypted for Impact), T1078 (Valid Accounts), and T1566 (Phishing). No law enforcement takedowns have been documented as of 2023.

🔍 Detection Indicators

File‑based indicators include hashes (MD5: a1b2c3d4e5f6...) and the mutex name GlobalEcipekac_Mutex. Network IOCs include C2 domains ending in .onion and a user‑agent string Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Ecipekac/1.0). Behavioral signatures include rapid file‑system enumeration prior to encryption and deletion of Volume Shadow Copies via vssadmin.exe delete shadows /all /quiet. Registry keys under HKLMSOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRun pointing to a randomly named executable are common.

☠️ Risk & Impact

Ecipekac causes critical data loss due to its intermittent encryption, often rendering files unrecoverable even with decryption tools. Financial losses from ransom payments and operational downtime have affected manufacturing, healthcare, and logistics sectors, with average recovery costs exceeding $2 million per incident. Data exfiltration before encryption is also observed, adding a double‑extortion threat.

🛡️ Mitigation

Organizations should apply patches for VPN appliances (CVE‑2019‑11510, CVE‑2021‑34473), enforce multi‑factor authentication on RDP, and block outbound Tor traffic at the perimeter. Detection rules using YARA signatures for the custom packer and scheduled‑task creation can be implemented in EDR solutions. Regular offline backups and network segmentation are critical to reduce blast radius.

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