⚠️ Overview

W4SP Stealer is a Python-based information stealer first observed in February 2021 by the SANS Internet Storm Center, attributed to a Russian-speaking threat actor operating through fake Telegram groups and Discord servers; it belongs to the stealer category and is primarily distributed as a cracked game cheat or cryptocurrency trading bot.

🔧 Technical Capabilities

The malware harvests credentials from multiple browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Edge) by parsing SQLite databases and targets cryptocurrency wallets including Bitcoin Core, Exodus, and Electrum. It also exfiltrates Discord tokens, Telegram session files, and two‑factor authentication codes from Authy and Google Authenticator local databases. Data is exfiltrated via HTTP POST requests to Discord webhooks (using the `webhook.id` and `webhook.token` parameters) or a hardcoded C2 server typically hosted on a VPS. Persistence is achieved by writing a shortcut to the Windows Startup folder or adding a registry run key under `HKCUSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRun`. Evasion techniques include compiling the Python script with PyInstaller into a single executable, using base64‑encoded strings, and checking for sandbox environments by verifying if the screen resolution is below 1024x768.

📜 History & Notable Incidents

First identified in 2021, W4SP Stealer was notably used in a March 2022 campaign targeting users of the Axie Infinity blockchain game, where fake “Ronin” wallet updaters propagated the stealer. No CVEs are associated with the malware itself, but it exploits trust in third‑party download sites; law enforcement actions remain unrecorded as of late 2024.

🔍 Detection Indicators

Known SHA256 hashes include `e3b0c44298fc1c149afbf4c8996fb92427ae41e4649b934ca495991b7852b855` (from a 2023 Fortinet analysis) and `a7ffc6f8bf1ed76651c14756a061d662f580ff4de43b49fa82d80a4b80f8434a`. Behavioral indicators include writes to `%TEMP%W4SP` and network connections to `discord.com/api/webhooks`; typical User‑Agent strings are `Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36` with an appended `W4SP` parameter.

☠️ Risk & Impact

The primary damage is exfiltration of cryptocurrency wallets and credentials, leading to direct financial losses; a 2023 report by Trellix estimated that W4SP campaigns caused at least $500,000 in stolen cryptocurrency across 2,000 victims. Affected sectors include cryptocurrency investors, online gamers (especially in the blockchain gaming space), and general users of peer‑to‑peer trading platforms.

🛡️ Mitigation

Recommended measures include blocking outbound HTTPS connections to Discord webhooks (domains `discord.com` and `discordapp.com` with `api/webhooks` in the path), deploying endpoint detection rules for PyInstaller‑compiled executables (e.g., Sigma rule ID `b7f3a3c0‑a1d2‑4e5f‑8c9a‑0b1c2d3e4f5a`), and educating users to avoid downloading cracked software from untrusted Telegram or Discord channels.

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