Operation Triangulation: Leveraged by Exploiting an Undocumented Hardware Feature in iOS Devices
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A recent discovery by experts has revealed that the Operation Triangulation cyberespionage campaign, targeting Apple iOS devices, exploited an undocumented hardware feature. Researchers from the Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky uncovered this revelation, shedding light on the sophisticated tactics employed by threat actors to target iOS devices.
The campaign, which began at least in 2019 and is still ongoing, was uncovered by Kaspersky while monitoring network traffic on their corporate Wi-Fi network dedicated to mobile devices using the Kaspersky Unified Monitoring and Analysis Platform (KUMA).
Operation Triangulation utilized zero-click exploits, with the attack chain commencing through a message sent via the iMessage service to an iOS device. This message contained an attachment that triggered a remote code execution vulnerability without any user interaction.
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Following Kaspersky’s disclosure, Russia’s FSB accused US intelligence of orchestrating the attacks against iPhones, targeting thousands of iOS devices belonging to domestic subscribers, diplomatic missions, and embassies as part of Operation Triangulation. The operations aimed at gathering intelligence from diplomats of various countries.
The attack chain relied on the exploitation of four zero-day vulnerabilities impacting iOS versions up to iOS 16.2, allowing threat actors to gain root privileges on the target iOS device and install the spyware implant, tracked as TriangleDB. The implant, directly deployed in memory, uninstalls itself after 30 days if the system is not rebooted, although attackers can extend this period.
The researchers also discovered that the attackers exploited an undocumented, Apple-only ADJUST TrueType font instruction, as well as an integer overflow vulnerability and a bypass of the Page Protection Layer (PPL) to execute a shellcode and another kernel exploit.
Notably, the attackers abused a hardware feature of Apple-designed SoCs to bypass hardware-based security protections, raising questions about the origin and purpose of this unknown hardware feature.
The analysis of the exploit used in the Operation Triangulation attack revealed that the exploit specifically targeted Apple A12–A16 Bionic SoCs, leveraging unknown MMIO blocks of registers, which are not defined in the device tree.
This revelation underscores the challenges posed by advanced hardware-based protections in the face of sophisticated attackers, highlighting the need for continued vigilance and innovation in cybersecurity.
The presentation titled “Operation Triangulation: What You Get When Attack iPhones of Researchers,” delivered by Boris Larin, Leonid Bezvershenko, and Georgy Kucherin at the 37th Chaos Communication Congress (37C3), provided further insights into the intricate cyberespionage campaign and its implications for iOS device security.
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