Hackers Get to ASUS Live Update Servers, Plant Malware in Thousands of Computers

INSTG8R · Mar 26, 2019

Their response with a security check tool. Apparently this only affected notebooks.

https://www.asus.com/News/hqfgVUyZ6uyAyJe1

MnkyBrs · Mar 26, 2019

Great, you don't have auto-update on. But this problem has been out there for a couple months without anyone knowing about it. So even if you manually update, you could still have done it yourself, no?

Esse · Mar 26, 2019

I had it set to auto-update but it never did. It's running an old version from the time I got the notebook.

FlanK3r · Mar 26, 2019

It is fixed now. There is soft to control it if your PC/notebook is fine.
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win10/ASUSDiagnosticTool/ASDT_v1.0.1.0.zip

muchoman · Mar 26, 2019

kaspersky=russian
you believe?

Tomorrow · Mar 26, 2019

RH92 said:
As far as AM4 goes Asrock has good hardware but their bios is a big joke : missing bios options , abysmal ram oc/support , bios updates take ages even for simple bugs and brake more things than they do fix , moved from Fatality AB350 itx to Strix B450-i for this exact reason and i can tell you for sure that ASUS are miles ahead in terms of OC features , relevant bios updates etc etc . If for some reason you don't want to go with ASUS i would advise you to go with MSI especialy now that they have implemented offset voltage , don't make the Asrock mistake !

I can second some of these points building a AsRock B450 based system last week. The BIOS is confusing with the same options in several places. But if you change it in one place it does not change in another. Plus i have a bug with code 98 displaying for nearly a minute before the board boots. Supposedly it's related to PCI-E which i don't even have any devices connected. It's also pretty rich if you reach some option and the help section instead of you know...helping displays: No help string. Like seriously. Did someone forgot to include it or what?

Also no luck overcloking RAM so far. 3000Mhz rated kit and XMP option is unstable at 2933 or anything above it even when keying in specific values from Ryzen DRAM calculator based on my memory (Teamgroup Delta RGB 2x4GB using Micron B-Die chips).

Also unlike ASUS and some others the BIOS does not show what settings you have changed when saving or exiting. You can't select to load or save custom profiles with only keyboard. The RGB tool is unable to control connected RAM sticks from BIOS. The autoupdate tool for ODD-less systems supposedly downloads drivers to...somewhere on disk which i have yet to find where.

God what a mess. I should have gone with ASUS instead. Not saying they are perfect but atleast their hardware and BIOS is manageable. Well except for Z390 VRM-s and windows based software.

Tatty_Two · Mar 26, 2019

muchoman said:
kaspersky=russian
you believe?

Founded in Russia and it's Global Headquarters is in Moscow I beleive.

Psimoes · Mar 26, 2019

i did a bios update on my maximus XI this week ,a popup of ez update showed up and updated

am i in danger?

moproblems99 · Mar 26, 2019

Psimoes said:
i did a bios update on my maximus XI this week ,a popup of ez update showed up and updated

am i in danger?

Only if your MAC was one of the targeted which I would highly doubt.

INSTG8R · Mar 26, 2019

Psimoes said:
i did a bios update on my maximus XI this week ,a popup of ez update showed up and updated

am i in danger?

Nope the program was distributed for ASUS Notebooks. Try running the detection tool they have provided I guarantee it will error out for "unsupported hardware"

Abaidor · Mar 26, 2019

Tomorrow said:
God what a mess. I should have gone with ASUS instead. Not saying they are perfect but atleast their hardware and BIOS is manageable. Well except for Z390 VRM-s and windows based software.

Their BIOS is the best as far as I am concerned. If only they would make a serious effort on the software front they would be perfect and all features would be working. I really wonder if there is even a manager in charge of all this and why on earth isn't he/she doing something....What is possibly holding them back from solving their software issues? Is it so hard to produce proper motherboard software given the resources and experience of Asus? Is it simple arrogance? Who knows and why should we care when other products "Just Work" (pun intended)....lol.

Psimoes · Mar 26, 2019

moproblems99 said:
Only if your MAC was one of the targeted which I would highly doubt.

i checked on kaspberry mac checker and i seem good

moproblems99 · Mar 26, 2019

Abaidor said:
Their BIOS is the best as far as I am concerned. If only they would make a serious effort on the software front they would be perfect and all features would be working. I really wonder if there is even a manager in charge of all this and why on earth isn't he/she doing something....What is possibly holding them back from solving their software issues? Is it so hard to produce proper motherboard software given the resources and experience of Asus? Is it simple arrogance? Who knows and why should we care when other products "Just Work" (pun intended)....lol.

What motherboard software could you possibly need?

R-T-B · Mar 26, 2019

muchoman said:
kaspersky=russian
you believe?

I mean, they are HQ'd in Russia. Or do you mean you don't believe them because they are russian? If so that's silly, this is pretty verifiable and they have a good track record on such things. The only thing the US government was suspicious of is what their AV was collecting, and whether it could be secretly seized by the Russian government and/or courts, hardly whether or not it worked or the company was honest.

moproblems99 said:
What motherboard software could you possibly need?

If you ask me the bios should handle all of that, but that seems to be a "times are changing" kind of thing.

Xzibit said:
Don't AVs in general send info (statistics home) whether you give them permission or not every time they call home to check for a update.

Depends on the AV Vendor but it's hardly rare. The issue is jurisdiction in Kaspersky's case (regarding why the USA pounced on them).

INSTG8R · Mar 26, 2019

moproblems99 said:
What motherboard software could you possibly need?

Well my Sabertooth has 2 extra fans, one cooling the VRM and one on the board. Without AI Suite I can't control them and they can't do their "magic" reverse dust spin thing and post shut down cooling cycle.
I totally agree with Abaidor, ASUS has the best BIOS BUT the absolute WORST software...There was the period of time a Windows update broke all ASUS software and I was left high and dry. ASUS put a "new" version of AI Suite out as a solution. It didn't even see ANYTHING on my board so it was absolutely useless to me and well ASUS is also terrible with uninstallers, once you get it in there getting it out again is near impossible.
But bottom line I NEED AI Suite and specifically the one for my motherboard, not a generic version.But I strip it down on install to just the bit I need because it always comes with a ton of bloat.Just built a 2600X rig for a friend on an ASUS board recently and it's still the buggy bloated mess even now.

moproblems99 · Mar 27, 2019

INSTG8R said:
Well my Sabertooth has 2 extra fans, one cooling the VRM and one on the board. Without AI Suite I can't control them and they can't do their "magic" reverse dust spin thing and post shut down cooling cycle.
I totally agree with Abaidor, ASUS has the best BIOS BUT the absolute WORST software...There was the period of time a Windows update broke all ASUS software and I was left high and dry. ASUS put a "new" version of AI Suite out as a solution. It didn't even see ANYTHING on my board so it was absolutely useless to me and well ASUS is also terrible with uninstallers, once you get it in there getting it out again is near impossible.
But bottom line I NEED AI Suite and specifically the one for my motherboard, not a generic version.But I strip it down on install to just the bit I need because it always comes with a ton of bloat.Just built a 2600X rig for a friend on an ASUS board recently and it's still the buggy bloated mess even now.

Understood. My Strix 580 was the worst of my group and the one board from them I owned was nothing fantastic. But I won't touch ASUS after Arez anyway.

INSTG8R · Mar 27, 2019

moproblems99 said:
Understood. My Strix 580 was the worst of my group and the one board from them I owned was nothing fantastic. But I won't touch ASUS after Arez anyway.

Oh I'm first to admit ASUS software sucks to high heaven, sadly some of us are dependent on said suck...This fiasco really doesn't surprise me just more of that good old ASUS software...

Abaidor · Mar 27, 2019

moproblems99 said:
What motherboard software could you possibly need?

As others pointed out I mostly need the Fan control package (Fan Expert 4) and although my motherboard has extensive options in Q-FAN (BIOS) that I use, you always need to reboot in order to make adjustments. Yet, some things are not possible through BIOS. Have a look at Aquaero & Aquasuite and you will see what I mean.

Most probably I will end up with an Aquaero + their LED controllers since both fan/pump/sensor control through BIOS is limited while Aura is simply a piece of junk software once you add some burden to it while it lacks in features and stability. Damn Aura does not even have profiles.

TheGuruStud · Mar 29, 2019

moproblems99 said:
It really is a guestimation. They know they had 57,000 clients that had the infection and they likely know how many clients have ASUS mobos so it was a simple extrapolation. Symantec reported 13,000 of their clients had it.

What I find the most interesting is that the attackers already knew the MAC addresses they were targeting. I would surmise that they retrieved those from the previous ASUS hack they did.

Cmon, now, symantec couldn't detect malware on a 12 yr old boy's porn laptop.

System Name	Hellbox 5.1(same case new guts)
Processor	Ryzen 7 5800X3D
Motherboard	MSI X570S MAG Torpedo Max
Cooling	TT Kandalf L.C.S.(Water/Air)EK Velocity CPU Block/Noctua EK Quantum DDC Pump/Res
Memory	2x16GB Gskill Trident Neo Z 3600 CL16
Video Card(s)	Powercolor Hellhound 7900XTX
Storage	970 Evo Plus 500GB 2xSamsung 850 Evo 500GB RAID 0 1TB WD Blue Corsair MP600 Core 2TB
Display(s)	Alienware QD-OLED 34” 3440x1440 144hz 10Bit VESA HDR 400
Case	TT Kandalf L.C.S.
Audio Device(s)	Soundblaster ZX/Logitech Z906 5.1
Power Supply	Seasonic TX~1000 Platinum
Mouse	G502 Hero
Keyboard	G19s
VR HMD	Oculus Quest 3
Software	Win 11 Pro x64

System Name	Tybalt
Processor	Intel Core i5-4690 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor
Motherboard	Asus H97I-PLUS Mini ITX LGA1150 Motherboard
Cooling	Noctua NH-U9S 46.44 CFM CPU Cooler
Memory	Crucial Ballistix Tactical 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
Video Card(s)	Radeon R9 Fury
Storage	ADATA XPG SX8200 480 GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive
Display(s)	LG 27EA73LM 60Hz 27.0" Monitor
Case	NCase M1V5B2
Audio Device(s)	AKG K271 MKII w/ Antlion ModMic 4
Power Supply	Corsair SF 600 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular SFX Power Supply
Mouse	Mionix NAOS QG
Keyboard	KBDFans 5° w/ Tealios/Zealios

System Name	ASUS ROG GL702
Processor	Intel i7-7700HQ @ 2.8GHz
Memory	2x8GB DDR4-2133
Video Card(s)	Nvidia GTX1060M 6GB
Storage	2x250GB SSD
Display(s)	1080p
Audio Device(s)	Xiaomi Piston 3 IEM
Mouse	FinalMouse
Software	Windows 10 64bit

System Name	AMD forever, AMD overclocker
Processor	Athlon 3000+ Venice, Athlon x2 4600+ EE Windsor,x4 955 BE@3.9GHz AIR, X4 965 BE, x4 970 BE, x6 1090T
Motherboard	Asus C5F-Z, Asus C5F, Asus C4E, Asus C4F, Asus RIIIE, Asus R4E, Asus M5F, Asus M6F, Asus M7H,
Cooling	Corsair H100, Swiftech H220, CM Hyper 212, Xigmatek 1283 DK+Ultra Kaze, CM V6GT, Noctua NHD14
Memory	Kingston Hyper X, 1600 A-Data 2000x, Corsair Dominator GT 2000 MHz, GSkill TridentX 2400MHz, HyperX
Video Card(s)	HD3870 512MB GDDR4, HD5770 1024MB GDDR5, ATI HD4870, HD 6870 GDDR5, HD 7870,Radeon R9-270X
Storage	2x 320GB WD+Samsung, 1x 500 GB Samsung, SSD X-25, SSD HyperX, SSD Seagate, SSD Corsair GT
Display(s)	BenQ 24" 24XL
Case	HAF 922, Aspire X-Cruiser, benchtable Wroom
Power Supply	Seasonic 500W and Seasonic 650W, Corsair AX 1200W, Zalman Goldrock 750, Galaxy OC edition 1200W
Software	x64 win 7 and x86 Win XP SP3
Benchmark Scores	you rather I do not want to see .. :-D !!!Thuban coming soon, new secret Gigabyte mobo too !!!

System Name	DarkStar
Processor	AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D
Motherboard	Gigabyte X570 Aorus Master 1.0 (BIOS F39g)
Cooling	Arctic Liquid Freezer II 420mm AIO (rev4)
Memory	4x8GB Patriot Viper DDR4 4400C19 @ 3733Mhz 14-14-13-27 1T
Video Card(s)	Gigabyte Radeon RX 9070 XT Gaming OC 16GB GDDR6 @ 3400Mhz Core/22Gbps Mem
Storage	1TB Samsung 990 Pro (OS);2TB Samsung PM9A1;4TB XPG S70 Blade (Games);14TB WD UltraStar HC530 (Video)
Display(s)	27" LG UltraGear 27GS85Q-B @ 2560x1440 @ 200Hz, Nano-IPS
Case	be quiet! Dark Base Pro 900 Rev.2
Audio Device(s)	SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless
Power Supply	1000W Seasonic PRIME Ultra Titanium;600W APC SMT750i UPS
Mouse	Logitech G604
Keyboard	Logitech G910 Orion Spark
Software	Windows 11 Pro x64 24H2 (Build 26100.4351)

Hackers Get to ASUS Live Update Servers, Plant Malware in Thousands of Computers

INSTG8R

Vanguard Beta Tester

MnkyBrs

Esse

FlanK3r

muchoman

Tomorrow

Tatty_Two

Gone Fishing

Psimoes

New Member

moproblems99

INSTG8R

Vanguard Beta Tester

Abaidor

Psimoes

New Member

moproblems99

R-T-B

INSTG8R

Vanguard Beta Tester

moproblems99

INSTG8R

Vanguard Beta Tester

Abaidor

TheGuruStud

Processor	Intel Core i9 11900KF @ -.080mV PL max @220w
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Cooling	DeepCool LS520SE Liquid + 3 Phanteks 140mm case fans
Memory	32GB (4 x 8GB SR) Patriot Viper Steel Bdie @ 3600Mhz CL14 1.45v Gear 1
Video Card(s)	Asus Dual RTX 4070 OC + 8% PL
Storage	WD Blue SN550 1TB M.2 NVME//Crucial MX500 500GB SSD (OS)
Display(s)	AOC Q2781PQ 27 inch Ultra Slim 2560 x 1440 IPS
Case	Phanteks Enthoo Pro M Windowed - Gunmetal
Audio Device(s)	Onboard Realtek ALC1200/SPDIF to Sony AVR @ 5.1
Power Supply	Seasonic CORE GM650w Gold Semi modular
Software	Win 11 Home x64

System Name	Wut?
Processor	3900X
Motherboard	ASRock Taichi X570
Cooling	Water
Memory	32GB GSkill CL16 3600mhz
Video Card(s)	Vega 56
Storage	2 x AData XPG 8200 Pro 1TB
Display(s)	3440 x 1440
Case	Thermaltake Tower 900
Power Supply	Seasonic Prime Ultra Platinum

System Name	NEO
Processor	i9-7940X All cores @ 4.8GHZ
Motherboard	Asus Rampage VI Extreme
Cooling	MO-RA 420 Pro Radiator Stainless Steel, EK X-TOP Revo Dual D5,EK Velocity, Phanteks 1080Ti GPU Block
Memory	64GB Trident Z RGB 3600 Quad Kit
Video Card(s)	Asus Strix 1080Ti OC
Storage	Samsung 960Pro, WD Gold 10TB, 2X WD Red 4TB
Display(s)	Benq SW320 32" 4k, Samsung 24" Full HD
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Power Supply	Corsair AX1500i
Mouse	Logitech MX Master 2s, Logitech G502 Hero
Keyboard	Logitech
Software	Windows 10 Pro

System Name	Pioneer
Processor	Ryzen 9 9950X
Motherboard	MSI MAG X670E Tomahawk Wifi
Cooling	Noctua NH-D15 + A whole lotta Sunon, Phanteks and Corsair Maglev blower fans...
Memory	64GB (2x 32GB) G.Skill Flare X5 @ DDR5-6200(Running 1T no GDM)
Video Card(s)	PNY RTX 5080 OC
Storage	Intel 5800X Optane 800GB boot, +2x Crucial P5 Plus 2TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSDs, 1x 2TB Seagate Exos 3.5"
Display(s)	55" LG 55" B9 OLED 4K Display
Case	Thermaltake Core X31
Audio Device(s)	TOSLINK->Schiit Modi MB->Asgard 2 DAC Amp->AKG Pro K712 Headphones or HDMI->B9 OLED
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Mouse	Logitech G305 Lightspeed Wireless
Keyboard	WASD Code v3 with Cherry Green keyswitches + PBT DS keycaps
Software	Gentoo Linux x64 / Windows 11 Enterprise (yes it's legit)

Processor	OCed 5800X3D
Motherboard	Asucks C6H
Cooling	Air
Memory	32GB
Video Card(s)	OCed 9070XT red devil
Storage	NVMees
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Audio Device(s)	Sennheiser, Custom 5.1
Power Supply	Don't even remember