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This is a simulation of attack by (Static Kitten) APT group targeting multiple sectors across the Middle East, including diplomatic, maritime, financial, and telecom entities. The campaign uses icon spoofing and malicious Word documents to deliver "RustyWater," a Rust-based implant representing a significant upgrade to their traditional toolkit, the attack campaign was active early as January 2026. The attackers has relied on PowerShell and VBS loaders for initial access and post-compromise operations. The introduction of Rust-based implants represents a notable tooling evolution toward more structured, modular, and low noise RAT capabilities. I relied on cloudsek to figure out the details to make this simulation: https://www.cloudsek.com/blog/reborn-in-rust-muddywater-evolves-tooling-with-rustywater-implant
![imageedit_3_7338603847](https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/3248f058-273c-423d-b323-f94099898668)
The attack kicks off with a spear-phishing email sent from the compromised info@tmcell address — a legitimate domain tied to TMCell (Altyn Asyr CJSC), Turkmenistan's main mobile telecom provider. The subject line reads "Cybersecurity Guidelines", making it look like an official advisory from a trusted source.
The email carries an attachment named Cybersecurity.doc, which acts as the initial payload. When the recipient opens the document and enables macros (as prompted), an obfuscated VBA macro runs. This macro extracts a hex-encoded blob hidden in the document's structure (often within UserForm elements), cleans it up by stripping spaces and line breaks, converts it to binary, and drops it as CertificationKit.ini in the ProgramData folder.
That dropped file is actually an installer that launches the final stage: a Rust-compiled executable (masquerading as reddit.exe with a Cloudflare icon). Known as RustyWater (also linked to Archer RAT / RUSTRIC), this implant handles persistence via registry Run keys, injects into processes for evasion, and sets up asynchronous command-and-control over HTTP using JSON payloads. The C2 traffic features Base64 encoding combined with XOR obfuscation to stay under the radar from AV and EDR tools.
Throughout, the macro itself is heavily obfuscated to dodge static detection, and the overall chain emphasizes low-noise execution with strong anti-analysis tricks built into the Rust binary. This progression — phishing email → malicious doc → obfuscated macro dropper → RustyWater implant — shows Static Kitten's shift toward more resilient, modular tooling in recent campaigns targeting Middle East sectors.
![695fae75028332920172b552_54c74b00](https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/eb4ed208-5e65-425d-9723-51639870c813)