Fast Facts:
- The Cyber espionage group Forest Blizzard is attributed to the GRU (Russia’s military intelligence agency).
- Forest Blizzard is also known by its numerous aliases: APT 28, Fancy Bear, Pawn Storm, Sednit Gang, Sofacy Group, BlueDelta, and STRONTIUM.
- Forest Blizzard is known for constantly evolving its tactics, developing custom tools (like GooseEgg), and employing a layered approach to maintain access to compromised systems.
- Forest Blizzard invests heavily in crafting highly believable social engineering attacks, often leveraging information gleaned from social media to personalize them. This makes them particularly adept at bypassing traditional security measures.
- Polish Institutions (May 2024): Recent reports suggest ongoing attacks targeting Polish government institutions.
- The motives of Forest Blizzard are its interest in confidential geopolitical data that would benefit the Russian state.
By Nischal Khadgi and Ujwal Thapa; Security Researcher
Table of Contents
Who is Forest Blizzard?
Forest Blizzard(G0007) is a threat group associated with Russia’s GRU intelligence service and has been active since 2008. The group’s origins can be traced back to the mid-2000s, with operations believed to have started around 2008. The group is attributed to the Russian military intelligence agency, as most of Forest Blizzard's victims are targeted in ways that indirectly benefit the Russian government.
Who are they targeting?
Forest Blizzard has primarily targeted entities within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), NATO-partnered organizations and institutions, organizations in the aerospace and defense sectors, government agencies, hospitality, international sports bodies, and the media. Additionally, Forest Blizzard has been observed conducting cyber operations during the Russia-Ukraine war, further aligning with Russia's strategic objectives. Forest Blizzard’s targeted regions have mostly been observed in Europe, the South Caucasus, Central Asia, and North and South America.
Based on our research, we have created a report that provides a comprehensive overview of Forest Blizzard. In this report, you can learn more about the group, its history, cyber operations, malware details, associated attacks and detection, investigation, and response using Logpoint.
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