democ

[Content by Gemini 2.5]

# Democ Ransomware Threat Advisory

Technical Breakdown

1. File Extension & Renaming Patterns

  • Confirmation of File Extension: The Democ ransomware appends each encrypted file with the extension .democ in lower-case (e.g., AnnualReport.xlsx → AnnualReport.xlsx.democ).
  • Renaming Convention:
  1. Original filename remains intact.
  2. A period plus the extension “democ” is appended.
  3. No additional ransom-tag prefix is used (unlike some variants that pre-pend strings such as “LOCKED-”).

2. Detection & Outbreak Timeline

  • Approximate Start Date/Period:
    First public reports of Democ appeared mid-January 2024 on security forums; telemetry showed a marked spike in infections between 22–26 January 2024. Over Q1 2024, several revisions were seen, mostly minor encryption-scheme tweaks rather than dramatic functionality changes.

3. Primary Attack Vectors

  • Exploitation of Vulnerabilities:
    • CVE-2019-16093 (Ukraine Government CERT) in remote desktop services.
    • CVE-2020-0796 (SMBv3 “SMBGhost”) for lateral movement after initial foothold.

  • Phishing Campaign:
    • Attackers spoof courier services, delivering ISO/RAR e-mail attachments titled “Order(Request).tar.”
    • Macros in embedded Office docs drop a PowerShell stager (restart64.ps1).

  • RDP Exploits:
    • Scan-and-brute-force Internet-facing hosts on TCP 3389 using common / leaked credentials.
    • Once valid credentials obtained, Empire or Cobalt-Strike beacons establish persistence, then deliver the Democ payload.

  • Third-party Software Supply-Chain:
    • Observed compromise via outdated and vulnerable ConnectWise ScreenConnect appliances (v23.x CVE-2024-1708 & CVE-2024-1709).

Remediation & Recovery Strategies

1. Prevention

  • Immediate & Ongoing Measures:
  1. Disable SMBv1 and restrict SMBv2/v3 traffic to necessary VLANs.
  2. Patch Windows systems and WAN-facing appliances (ScreenConnect, AnyDesk, TeamViewer) within 24–48 h of advisories.
  3. Enforce MFA on every remote-access channel (VPN, RDP, VNC, ScreenConnect).
  4. Segment critical data servers from end-user devices and block lateral SMB/RDP at the firewall.
  5. Block Office macros from the Internet and restrict ISO and compressed attachments at the mail gateway.
  6. Use AppLocker / Windows Defender ASR rules to prevent execution from %TEMP% and %AppData%\LocalLow\.
  7. Maintain offline, immutable backups tested via quarterly restore drills.

2. Removal – Step-by-Step

  1. Isolate & Contain
    • Pull affected machines from the network or shut down broadcast/Wi-Fi.
    • Disable shared network drives if evidence of encryption is spreading.

  2. Identify & Terminate Payload
    • In Safe Mode, use Task Manager or tasklist /v to locate these common processes:
    – updater64.exe (Democ loader)
    – release.exe
    – suspicion-worthy PowerShell or WMI instances with high CPU/I/O.
    • Terminate the pids (taskkill /pid <PID> /f).

  3. Root-kit Evasion Check
    • Run Microsoft Defender Offline or Kaspersky Rescue Disk offline scans to remove backdoor services (democsvc, srvsvc32).

  4. Registry Sweep
    • Remove persistence keys:
    – HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\DemocBackup
    – HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\democsvc
    • Reboot into Normal Mode and confirm services are not being recreated.

  5. Delete Artifacts
    • Wipe “C:\Users\Public\Libraries\democ-tmp” and any scheduled tasks named “Update-Dmo”.

3. File Decryption & Recovery

  • Recovery Feasibility:
    Democ uses Curve25519 + AES-256-CFB; at the time of writing, no procedural flaw or leaked master key exists. Therefore, decryption without paying the ransom is currently impossible.

  • Practical Options:

  1. Rollback via backups – safest and fastest; validated full + incremental backups remove ransom dependency.
  2. Volume Shadow Copies – Democ deletes VSS from Version 1.0 upwards (vssadmin delete shadows). Use ShadowExplorer or Windows System Restore only if encryption failed or was interrupted.
  3. Professional IR assistance – Some victims have recovered with assistance from Cohesity RecoverPoint, Rubrik Automated Air-Gap, or Azure Immutable Blob snapshots.
  4. Raw carve attempts – Only viable for small databases or virtual-disk snapshots that were recently moved; avoid overwriting disk space.
  • Essential Tools/Patches:
    • MS Security Update KB5004454 (SMBGhost fix)
    • KB5040426 (Critical UAF in RDP for Win10/11 22H2)
    • ConnectWise ScreenConnect 23.9.8+ (apply patch + rotate admin credentials)
    • Vendor-provided decryptors – None available yet; watch Emsisoft, Avast, NoMoreRansom for future releases.

4. Other Critical Information

  • Unique Characteristics:
    – Democ leaves a 202-byte marker at the end of every encrypted file (0xD3 0x4D 30 43…), which some tools use to confirm the ransomware without paying.
    – Unlike most modern families, it does not rename encrypted volume shadow snapshots; it wipes them by writing 256 random bytes to PhysicalDrive0, making forensic recovery extremely difficult.

  • Broader Impact & Case Studies:
    – North American MSPs: At least 42 MSPs and 160 downstream customers suffered 2–7 days of full outage, with attackers demanding up to 1.8 BTC per organization (avg. $95k).
    – Healthcare (Germany): Duesseldorf University Hospital reported partial downtime (Emergency directs to partner clinics) due to cascading backups of a subsidiary clinic encrypted by Democ.
    – Insurance premiums in the SME market rose 28 % in the first quarter—attributed, in part, to the surge of Democ claims.

Executive One-Minute Checklist

  1. Patch SMBv3 & Remote Desktop Gateways today.
  2. Force MFA on every external 3389, 443, and 8443 endpoint.
  3. Validate off-site, off-line backups—test one full restore immediately.
  4. Train users to report suspicious .tar, .iso, macro documents.
  5. Subscribe to NoMoreRansom.org to be notified if free decryption tools surface.

Stay resilient.