South Asian Ministries Hit by SideWinder APT Using Old Office Flaws and Custom Malware

SideWinder APT Hackers Exploits Legacy Office Vulnerabilities to Deploy Malware Undetected

The Acronis Threat Research Unit (TRU) has revealed an advanced campaign believed to be orchestrated by the SideWinder advanced persistent threat (APT) group. This operation, running through early 2025, has primarily targeted high-value government and military institutions across Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, exploiting unpatched legacy Microsoft Office vulnerabilities to deploy credential-stealing malware while evading […] The post SideW…

SideWinder APT targets South Asian government agencies: Historical Office vulnerabilities and malware coordinated attacks

South Asian Ministries Hit by SideWinder APT Using Old Office Flaws and Custom Malware

High-level government institutions in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan have emerged as the target of a new campaign orchestrated by a threat actor known as SideWinder. "The attackers used spear phishing emails paired with geofenced payloads to ensure that only victims in specific countries received the malicious content," Acronis researchers Santiago Pontiroli, Jozsef Gegeny, and Prakas