Introduction: Nation state attacks on supply chains
In recent years, supply chain attacks have surged in both frequency and sophistication, evolving into one of the most severe threats to organizations across almost every industry. By exploiting third-party vendors and service providers, these attacks can inflict widespread disruption with a single breach. They have become a go-to choice for nation state actors and show no signs of slowing down. According to Gartner, the costs from these attacks will skyrocket “from $46 billion in 2023 to $138 billion by 2031” [1].
But why are supply chains specifically such an irresistible target for threat actors? Dwight D. Eisenhower, the General of the US Army in World War II and former US President, once said, “you won’t find it difficult to prove that battles, campaigns, and even wars have been won or lost primarily because of logistics.”
The same is true in cyberspace and cyberwarfare. We live in an increasingly interconnected world. The provision of almost every service integral to our daily lives relies on a complex web of interdependent third parties.
Naturally, threat actors gravitate towards these service providers. By compromising just one of them, they can spread through supply chains downstream to other organizations and raise the odds of winning their battle, campaign, or war.
A house built on open-source sand
Software developers face immense pressure to produce functional code quickly, often under tight deadlines. Adding to this challenge is the need to comply with stringent security requirements set by their DevSecOps counterparts, who aim to ensure that code is safe from vulnerabilities.
Open-source repositories alleviate some of this pressure by providing pre-built packages of code and fully functioning tools that developers can freely access and integrate. These highly accessible resources enhance productivity and boost innovation. As a result, they have a huge, diverse user base spanning industries and geographies. However, given their extensive adoption, any security lapse can result in widespread compromise across businesses.
Cautionary tales for open-source dependencies
This is exactly what happened in December 2021 when a remote code execution vulnerability was discovered in Log4J’s software. In simple terms, it exposed an alarmingly straightforward way for attackers to take control of any system using Log4J.
The scope for potential attack was unprecedented. Some estimates say up to 3 billion devices were affected worldwide, in what was quickly labelled the “single biggest, most critical vulnerability of the last decade” [2].
What ensued was a race between opportunistic nefarious actors and panicked security professionals. The astronomical number of vulnerable devices laid expansive groundwork for attackers, who quickly began probing potentially exploitable systems. 48% of corporate networks globally were scanned for the vulnerability, while security teams scrambled to apply the remediating patch [3].
The vulnerability attracted nation states like a moth to a flame, who, unsurprisingly, beat many security teams to it. According to the FBI and the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), Iranian government-sponsored threat groups were found using the Log4J vulnerability to install cryptomining software, credential stealers and Ngrok reverse proxies onto no less than US Federal networks [4].
Research from Microsoft and Mandiant revealed nation state groups from China, North Korea and Turkey also taking advantage of the Log4J vulnerability to deploy malware on target systems [5].
If Log4j taught us anything, it’s that vulnerabilities in open-source technologies can be highly attractive target for nation states. When these technologies are universally adopted, geopolitical adversaries have a much wider net of opportunity to successfully weaponize them.
It therefore comes as no surprise that nation states have ramped up their operations targeting the open-source link of the supply chain in recent years.
Since 2020, there has been a 1300% increase in malicious threats circulating on open-source repositories. PyPI is the official open-source code repository for programming done in the Python language and used by over 800,000 developers worldwide. In the first 9 months of 2023 alone, 7,000 malicious packages were found on PyPI, some of which were linked to the North Korea state-sponsored threat group, Lazarus [6].
Most of them were found using a technique called typosquatting, in which the malicious payloads are disguised with names that very closely resemble those of legitimate packages, ready for download by an unwitting software developer. This trickery of the eye is an example of social engineering in the supply chain.
A hop, skip, and a jump into the most sensitive networks on earth
One of the most high-profile supply chain attacks in recent history occurred in 2023, targeting 3CX’s Desktop App – a widely used video communications by over 600,000 customers in various sectors such as aerospace, healthcare and hospitality.
The incident gained notoriety as a double supply chain attack. The initial breach originated from financial trading software called X_Trader, which had been infected with a backdoor. A 3CX employee unknowingly downloaded the compromised X_Trader software onto a corporate device. This allowed attackers to steal the employee’s credentials and use them to gain access to 3CX’s network, spread laterally and compromising Windows and Mac systems.
The attack moved along another link of the supply chain to several of 3CX’s customers, impacting critical national infrastructure like energy sector in US and Europe.
For the average software provider, this attack shed more light on how a compromise of their technology could cause chaos for their customers.
But nation states already knew this. The 3CX attack was attributed, yet again, to Lazarus, the same North Korean nation state blamed for implanting malicious packages in the Python repository.
It’s also worth mentioning the astounding piece of evidence in a separate social engineering campaign which linked the 3CX hack to North Korea. It was an attack worthy of a Hollywood cyber block buster. The threat group, Lazarus, lured hopeful job candidates on LinkedIn into clicking on malicious ZIP file disguised as an attractive PDF offer for a position as a Developer at HSBC. The malware’s command and control infrastructure, journalide[.]org, was the same one discovered in the 3CX campaign.
Though not strictly a supply chain attack, the LinkedIn campaign illustrates how nation states employ a diverse array of methods that span beyond the supply chain to achieve their goals. These sophisticated and well-resourced adversaries are adaptable and capable of repurposing their command-and-control infrastructure to orchestrate a range of attacks. This attack, along with the typosquatting attacks found in PyPI, serve as a critical reminder for security teams: supply chain attacks are often coupled with another powerful tactic – social engineering of human teams.
When the cure is worse than the disease
Updates to the software are a core pillar of cybersecurity, designed to patch vulnerabilities like Log4J and ensure it is safe. However, they have also proven to serve as alarmingly efficient delivery vessels for nation states to propagate their cyberattacks.
Two of the most prolific supply chain breaches in recent history have been deployed through malicious updates, illustrating how they can be a double-edged sword when it comes to cyber defense.
NotPetya (2017) and Solarwinds (2020)
The 2017 NotPetya ransomware attack exemplified the mass spread of ransomware via a single software update. A Russian military group injected malware on accounting software used by Ukrainian businesses for tax reporting. Via an automatic update, the ransomware was pushed out to thousands of customers within hours, crippled Ukrainian infrastructure including airports, financial institutions and government agencies.
Some of the hardest hit victims were suppliers themselves. Maersk, the global shipping giant responsible for shipping one fifth of the world’s goods, had their entire global operations brought to a halt and their 76 ports temporarily shut down. The interruptions to global trade were then compounded when a FedEx subsidiary was hit by the same ransomware. Meanwhile, Merck, a pharmaceutical company, was unable to supply vaccines to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention due to the attack.
In 2020, another devastating supply chain attack unfolded in a similar way. Threat actors tied to Russian intelligence embedded malicious code into Solarwinds’ Orion IT software, which was then distributed as an update to 18,000 organizations. Victims included at least eight U.S. government agencies, as well as several major tech companies.
These two attacks highlighted two key lessons. First, in a hyperconnected digital world, nation states will exploit the trust organizations place in software updates to cause a ripple effect of devastation downstream. Secondly, the economies of scale for the threat actor themselves are staggering: a single malicious update provided the heavy lifting work of dissemination to the attacker. A colossal number of originations were infected, and they obtained the keys to the world’s most sensitive networks.
The conclusion is obvious, albeit challenging to implement; organizations must rigorously scrutinize the authenticity and security of updates to prevent far-reaching consequences.
Geopolitics and nation States in 2024: Beyond the software supply chain
The threat to our increasingly complex web of global supply is real. But organizations must look beyond their software to successfully mitigate supply chain disruption. Securing hardware and logistics is crucial, as these supply chain links are also in the crosshairs of nation states.
In July 2024, suspicious packages caused a warehouse fire at a depot belonging to courier giant DHL in Birmingham, UK. British counter-terrorism authorities investigated Russian involvement in this fire, which was linked to a very similar incident that same month at a DHL facility in Germany.
In September 2024, camouflaged explosives were hidden in walkie talkies and pagers in Lebanon and Syria – a supply chain attack widely believed to be carried out by Israel.
While these attacks targeted hardware and logistics rather than software, the underlying rule of thumb remained the same: the compromise of a single distributor can provide the attackers with considerable economies of scale.
These attacks sparked growing concerns of coordinated efforts to sabotage the supply chain. This sentiment was reflected in a global survey carried out by HP in August 2024, in which many organisations reported “nation-state threat actors targeting physical supply chains and tampering with device hardware and firmware integrity” [7].
More recently, in November 2024, the Russian military unit 29155 vowed to “turn the lights out for millions” by threatening to launch cyberattacks on the blood supply of NATO countries, critical national infrastructure (CNI). Today, CNI encompasses more than the electric grid and water supply; it includes ICT services and IT infrastructure – the digital systems that underpin the foundations of modern society.
This is nothing new. The supply and logistics-focused tactic has been central to warfare throughout history. What’s changed is that cyberspace has merely expanded the scale and efficiency of these tactics, turning single software compromises into attack multipliers. The supply chain threat is now more multi-faceted than ever before.
Learnings from the supply chain threat landscape
Consider some of the most disastrous nation-state supply chain attacks in recent history – 3CX, NotPetya and Solarwinds. They share a remarkable commonality: the attackers only needed to compromise a single piece of software to cause rampant disruption. By targeting a technology provider whose products were deeply embedded across industries, threat actors leveraged the trust inherent in the supply chain to infiltrate networks at scale.
From a nation-state’s perspective, targeting a specific technology, device or service used by vast swathes of society amplifies operational efficiency. For software, hardware and critical service suppliers, these examples serve as an urgent wake-up call. Without rigorous security measures, they risk becoming conduits for global disruption. Sanity-checking code, implementing robust validation processes, and fostering a culture of security throughout the supply chain are no longer optional—they are essential.
The stakes are clear: in the interconnected digital age, the safety of countless systems, industries and society at large depends on their vigilance.
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References
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