Understanding the Play Ransomware Group's Impact

Introduction to Play Ransomware Group

Play ransomware group has claimed responsibility for attacking Ricardo. No further information is available at this time. Ricardo is a global strategic, environmental, and engineering consultancy at the intersection of transport, energy, and global climate agendas, solving the most complex issues to help achieve a safe and sustainable world.

Background of Play (aka PlayCrypt)

Play (aka PlayCrypt) is a RaaS that emerged in the summer of 2022 and is noted for having similarities to Hive and Nokoyawa ransomware strains. Play often compromises unpatched Fortinet SSL VPN vulnerabilities to gain access. Play has been observed leveraging Process Hacker, GMER, IOBit and PowerTool to bypass security solutions as well as PowerShell or command script to disable Windows Defender. Play made headlines with high-profile attacks on the City of Oakland, Argentina's Judiciary and German hotel chain H-Hotels, as well as exfiltrating data from Fedpol and the Federal Office for Customs and Border Security (FOCBS).

Techniques and Tools Used by Play

Play is an evolving RaaS platform known to leverage PowerTool to disable antivirus and other security monitoring solutions and SystemBC RAT for persistence. Play is known to leverage tools like Cobalt Strike for post-compromise lateral movement and SystemBC RAT executables and legitimate tools Plink and AnyDesk to maintain persistence, as well as Mimikatz and living-off-the-land binaries (LOLBins) techniques. Play also abuses AdFind for command-line queries to collect information from a target’s Active Directory.

Innovations and Tactics

Play first introduced the intermittent encryption technique for improved evasion capabilities. Play also developed two custom data exfiltration tools - the Grixba information stealer and the open-source VSS management tool AlphaVSS - that improve efficiency in exfiltrating sensitive information on the targeted network, as well as the open-source VSS management tool AlphaVSS. Play has been observed leveraging exploits including ProxyNotShell, OWASSRF and a Microsoft Exchange Server RCE.

Geographical Focus and Attack Strategy

Play ransomware gang has mainly focused attacks in Latin America, especially Brazil, but have attack outside of that region. Play was observed to be running a worldwide campaign targeting managed service providers (MSPs) in August in an attempt to leverage their remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools to infiltrate customer networks. Play employs tactics similar to both the Hive and Nokoyawa ransomware gangs and engages in double extortion by first exfiltrating victim data with the threat to post it on their “leaks” website.