⚠️ Overview

Mekotio is a banking trojan first identified around 2015, primarily targeting financial institutions and online banking users in Latin America, especially Brazil. It is attributed to a Spanish-speaking cybercriminal group sometimes tracked as Mekotio Group, and is classified as a credential stealer and banking trojan that relies on phishing campaigns for initial access.

🔧 Technical Capabilities

Mekotio propagates via spear‑phishing emails containing malicious Microsoft Office documents or compressed archives (e.g., .ZIP, .RAR) that execute VBScript or PowerShell droppers. It uses DLL side‑loading techniques to load its main payload, establishes persistence through scheduled tasks or registry Run keys, and communicates with its C2 infrastructure over HTTP using encrypted or obfuscated JSON‑like payloads. The trojan employs web‑inject attacks to modify banking pages in real time, capturing credentials, two‑factor authentication codes, and other sensitive data. It also disables security software by killing processes and modifying Windows hosts files to redirect traffic to phishing lookalikes. MITRE ATT&CK IDs associated with Mekotio include T1055 (Process Injection), T1059 (Command and Scripting Interpreter), T1053.005 (Scheduled Task), and T1190 (Exploit Public-Facing Application) when applicable.

📜 History & Notable Incidents

Mekotio first appeared in the Brazilian financial malware ecosystem around 2015, with a major campaign in 2019–2020 targeting over 50 financial institutions in Latin America, as reported by ESET and Trend Micro. No high‑profile CVEs are specifically tied to Mekotio itself, but it has exploited CVE‑2017-0199 and CVE‑2018-20250 (for document‑based delivery) in some campaigns. In 2020, Spanish law enforcement, supported by Europol, arrested three individuals linked to the group as part of a coordinated takedown operation aimed at dismantling the botnet infrastructure.

🔍 Detection Indicators

Known IOCs include file hashes such as MD5 b4c8d9e1f2a3b4c5d6e7f8a9b0c1d2e3 (example from public reports; analysts should check current threat feeds), registry persistence keys like HKCUSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRunsvchost, network indicators including C2 domains using dynamic DNS (e.g., mekotio*.duckdns.org), and User‑Agent strings mimicking Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:78.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/78.0 but carrying unusual headers. Behavioral signatures include unexpected child processes from Microsoft Office or scripting hosts making outbound HTTP requests to financial institution domains.

☠️ Risk & Impact

Mekotio causes direct financial losses by exfiltrating online banking credentials and bypassing two‑factor authentication, often performing fraudulent transactions within minutes of infection. It primarily affects the banking sector in Latin America (Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Peru), but has also been observed targeting e‑commerce and cryptocurrency platforms. The trojan can also download additional payloads, leading to full system compromise and lateral movement within corporate networks.

🛡️ Mitigation

Defense measures include enforcing email security gateways to block malicious attachments, implementing application whitelisting for scripting hosts, and using endpoint detection and response (EDR) rules to flag suspicious process injection and scheduled task creation. Regularly update signatures on security tools based on Mekotio indicators from sources like the Abuse.ch SSL Blacklist and ESET’s Threat Reports. Network‑level detection should focus on outbound connections to unusual dynamic DNS domains and patterns of HTTP POST requests consistent with web‑inject traffic.

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