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Powerful Spyware Exploits Enable a New String of ‘Watering Hole’ Attacks


Suspected Russian hackers have compromised a series of websites to utilize sophisticated spyware exploits that are eerily similar to those created by NSO Group and Intellexa.

In recent years, elite commercial spyware vendors like Intellexa and NSO Group have developed an array of powerful hacking tools that exploit rare and unpatched “zero-day” software vulnerabilities to compromise victim devices. Originally, they were deployed by the spyware vendors as unpatched, zero-day exploits, but in this iteration, the suspected Russian hackers were using them to target devices that hadn't been updated with these fixes. Between November 2023 and February 2024, the hackers used an iOS and Safari exploit that was technically identical to an offering that Intellexa had first debuted a couple of months earlier as an unpatched zero-day in September 2023.

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