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GCIH · Question #825

A popular forum for ICS professionals to discuss techniques includes code that loads scripts and ads from multiple external sites. How would an adversary leverage this forum to compromise ICS industry

The correct answer is A. Watering-hole. Compromising a trusted industry forum to deliver malicious scripts to its targeted professional visitors is the definition of a watering-hole attack.

Incident Response & Cyber Kill Chain

Question

A popular forum for ICS professionals to discuss techniques includes code that loads scripts and ads from multiple external sites. How would an adversary leverage this forum to compromise ICS industry targets?

Options

  • AWatering-hole
  • BSQL injection
  • CDenial of Service
  • Dtypo-squatting

How the community answered

(54 responses)
  • A
    89% (48)
  • B
    7% (4)
  • C
    2% (1)
  • D
    2% (1)

Why each option

Compromising a trusted industry forum to deliver malicious scripts to its targeted professional visitors is the definition of a watering-hole attack.

AWatering-holeCorrect

A watering-hole attack involves an adversary identifying websites frequented by a specific target group, then injecting or hosting malicious code on those sites - often via third-party scripts or ads - to silently compromise visitors. The ICS forum scenario matches this precisely: the attacker leverages trusted community infrastructure to reach ICS professionals without directly targeting their networks.

BSQL injection

SQL injection targets the database backend of a web application to extract or manipulate data, and does not involve leveraging external scripts to compromise visiting clients.

CDenial of Service

Denial of Service disrupts availability of a service and does not result in the compromise or exploitation of visiting users.

Dtypo-squatting

Typo-squatting involves registering domain names similar to legitimate ones to capture misdirected traffic, not injecting code into an existing trusted site.

Concept tested: Watering-hole attack targeting a specific industry community

Source: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1189/

Topics

#watering-hole attack#ICS targeting#drive-by compromise#spear phishing

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