Taiwanese storage producer QNAP has warned customers of a malware pressure that consumes massive quantities of CPU and reminiscence to mine cryptocurrency with out the proprietor’s consent. Stories of the Dovecat malware infecting QNAP units have been circulating for just a few months now however a brand new security advisory has solely simply been launched by the producer.
Evidently QNAP’s network-attached storage (NAS) units are susceptible to an infection if they’re protected by weak consumer passwords. The Dovecat malware is able to operating on any Linux system however seems to have been particularly designed to contaminate QNAP NAS units.
Though malware could also be extra generally related to credential theft or disruption to important options, a brand new kind of bitcoin miner malware has elevated in reputation of late as the worth of cryptocurrencies has risen. In truth, sightings of crypto-mining malware rose by 53% within the fourth quarter of final yr.
Mining malware
In response to the Dovecat discovery, QNAP has provided detailed recommendation for customers relating to the easiest way of minimizing the chance of being contaminated. This consists of updating QTS to the newest model, putting in a firewall, avoiding default port numbers, and following NAS security best practices.
QNAP customers initially observed that one thing was not fairly proper with their NAS system after they noticed two processes, Dovecat and dedpma, operating continually and consuming massive quantities of sources. The corporate issued a assist put up again in November confirming that the 2 processes have been related to bitcoin mining malware.
The Dovecat an infection isn’t the primary time that QNAP has been focused by a malware marketing campaign. Beforehand, the storage agency has needed to warn customers of the QSnatch malware and a number of ransomware makes an attempt.
Through Bleeping Computer
