CLR SqlShell Malware Targets MS SQL Servers for Crypto Mining and Ransomware

From thehackernews.com

Poorly managed Microsoft SQL (MS SQL) servers are the target of a new campaign that’s designed to propagate a category of malware called CLR SqlShell that ultimately facilitates the deployment of cryptocurrency miners and ransomware.

“Similar to web shell, which can be installed on web servers, SqlShell is a malware strain that supports various features after being installed on an MS SQL server, such as executing commands from threat actors and carrying out all sorts of malicious behavior,” AhnLab Security Emergency response Center (ASEC) said in a report published last week.

A stored procedure is a subroutine that contains a set of Structured Query Language (SQL) statements for use across multiple programs in a relational database management system (RDBMS).

CLR (short for common language runtime) stored procedures – available in SQL Server 2005 and later – refer to stored procedures that are written in a .NET language such as C# or Visual Basic.

Read more…