Trojanized DAEMON Tools Used to Deploy Persistent Backdoor Malware

An innocent routine software update mechanism has been weaponized by attackers in order to distribute malware through official distribution channels, enabling a stealthy global supply-chain compromise.
AVB Disc Soft authenticated digital certificates were used to sign trojanized builds as part of the operation that remained undetected for nearly a month. 

By bypassing conventional trust and endpoint security mechanisms, these malicious packages were able to avoid triggering immediate suspicion. Kaspersky discovered that the campaign began on April 8, 2026, and resulted in thousands of infections in over 100 countries before the breach was detected on May 1, 2026. 

Almost all infections were characterized by reconnaissance malware intended to gather system intelligence and establish persistence. However, a comparatively small number of carefully selected victims received advanced second-stage backdoors, suggesting a targeted attack on Russian, Belarusian, and Thai organizations involved in government, science, retail, and manufacturing.

Multiple core components of DAEMON Tools were modified, including DTHelper.exe, DiscSoftBusServiceLite.exe, and DTShellHlp.exe, and malicious functionality was embedded in versions 12.5.0.2421 through 12.5.0.2434, ensuring that execution occurs at startup while maintaining the appearance of legitimate software functionality.

According to the forensic analysis, the attackers had embedded their malicious framework within several trusted DAEMON Tools binaries, including the DTHelper.exe, DiscSoftBusServiceLite.exe, and DTShellHlp.exe that can be found within the installation directory of the application. Because the compromised binaries were signed by authentic AVB Disc Soft signing certificates, operating systems and endpoint security products perceived the compromised binaries as trustworthy, reducing the probability of immediate detection. 

It has been determined that every time the affected binaries are executed during system startup, the CRT initialization routine initiates hidden backdoor functionality, initiating a dedicated background thread aimed at quietly establishing outbound communication with attacker-controlled infrastructure during system startup. 

Throughout the attack, the malware repeatedly sent HTTP GET requests to a typosquatted domain that closely mimicked the legitimate DAEMON Tools download portal, as a method of mixing malicious traffic with expected software communications. According to WHOIS records, the fraudulent domain was registered on March 27, approximately one week before the supply chain intrusion occurred, indicating deliberate preparation of infrastructure prior to the attack by the campaign’s operators. 

Based on an analysis of the command-and-control infrastructure, it appeared that compromised systems were able to receive remotely issued shell commands via cmd.exe and PowerShell, which would allow attackers to download and execute additional payloads dynamically. 

PowerShell’s WebClient functionality was utilized to retrieve executable files from an Internet server located at 38.180.107[.]76 before silently executing them from temporary system directories and deleting all traces afterwards. In the course of the investigation, envchk.exe, a .NET-based information collector that researchers determined was intended to perform extensive reconnaissance on infected machines, was identified as one of the primary

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