VirusTotal += CloudStat URL scanner

Today we are introducing a new URL scanner that will be characterizing URLs submitted by users to VirusTotal: CloudStat. In their own words:

CloudStat is a new platform set to revolutionize the way companies collect and analyze their data. It identifies compliance gaps, detects configuration problems and warns customers of cyber security threats by applying our proprietary analysis engine to millions of data points. It delivers concise actionable reports directly to mobile devices. The team behind CloudStat is dedicated to helping companies mitigate risks, increase productivity and reduce costs.

Let us look at how their verdicts show up:
https://www.virustotal.com/en/url/2ea21e20088c61bbcec94722c5ef9dd17a663f03869c1f85cacab5c705288064/analysis/
https://www.virustotal.com/en/url/a6ae8a164711f280e4df6d88ba9cd8a7b5acc491824b29e09fdd4e0ff951944c/analysis/
https://www.virustotal.com/en/url/de364f9419c0ed25ed9731e7afb412a0a5d647774c2c54fab2bbee72215519ad/analysis/

Judging by the reports, it seems that this new engine nicely complements other datasets, such that aggregate threat coverage has been improved, this is good news. Hopefully this addition results in more secure users world-wide.

Welcome CloudStat!

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VirusTotal += Malekal

We are back with new inclusions in VirusTotal's URL scanning engine. This time we are excited to add Malekal's malicious URL dataset to our aggregate scanner.

Malekal is a site maintained by one of our most active VirusTotal Community users, @Malekal_morte. The site mostly deals with malware and antivirus but has support forums that help users in many other ICT fields. As a result of the support he gives and the research he conducts, Malekal comes across many malware samples an malicious URLs as we can see in his public listing (21211 documented files since March 2010 at the time of this article).

Malekal's malicious URL dataset is now being used to check whether any URL submitted by a user to VirusTotal is present in it and if so it is flagged accordingly. You should now be able to see these detections in the URL reports, just as an example:

https://www.virustotal.com/url/04d67bdebd8a74eaaac37212e35848203f55823c157aab958ad4415d1b7ba344/analysis/1354089612/

We are extremely grateful to Malekal, welcome on board!

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VirusTotal += Netcraft

Netcraft Toolbar is one of the most known antiphishing/antimalware browser toolbars out there. The Netcraft team describes its software as follows:

The Toolbar community is effectively a giant neighbourhood watch scheme, empowering the most alert and most expert members to defend everyone within the community against phishing attacks. Once the first recipients of a phishing mail have reported the target URL, it is blocked for community members as they subsequently access the URL. Widely disseminated attacks (people construct phishing attacks send literally millions of emails in the expectation that some will reach customers of the bank) simply mean that the phishing attack will be reported and blocked sooner.
The Netcraft Toolbar also:

• Traps suspicious URLs containing characters which have no common purpose other than to deceive.

• Enforces display of browser navigational controls (toolbar & address bar) in all windows, to defend against pop up windows which attempt to hide the navigational controls.

• Clearly displays sites' hosting location, including country, helping you to evaluate fraudulent urls (e.g. the real citibank.com or barclays.co.uk sites are unlikely to be hosted in the former Soviet Union).

Taking all of this into account we are really excited to announce that Netcraft has been integrated in VirusTotal, you will now see it as another URL scanner in VirusTotal's URL scanning service.

With this addition we have already over 30 URL scanners and are looking forward to be in the forties as soon as possible, so if you have an interesting malicious URL dataset or URL scanner please do not hesitate to contact us, we will be more than happy to include you!

Thank you Netcraft team!

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VirusTotal += Sucuri SiteCheck

It has been a while since we last added some new analyzer to our URL scanning engine, today we are excited to announce that Sucuri SiteCheck has become part of our small family. This is how the Sucuri team describes their service:

Sucuri SiteCheck is highly sophisticated and designed to identify a number of different malware types: Obfuscated JavaScript injections, Cross Site Scripting (XSS), Website Defacements, Hidden & Malicious iFrames, PHP Mailers, Phishing Attempts, Malicious Redirects, Backdoors (e.g., C99, R57, Webshells), Anomalies, Drive-by-Downloads, IP Cloaking, Social Engineering Attacks. There are a number of blacklisting authorities that monitor for malware, SPAM, and phishing attempts. Sucuri SiteCheck leverages the APIs for the following authorities to alert you when you’ve been flagged: Sucuri, Google Safe Browsing, Norton, AVG, Phish Tank (Phishing Specifically), McAfee SiteAdvisor.

We are extremely grateful to Sucuri, you should now see them on our URL reports, just as an example:

https://www.virustotal.com/url/78f6ade26461d84b32b857529613abbd8c9e1306fa3a4e6b9e9c8ff11dd1d82d/analysis/

You may read more about their technology at their services site.

Welcome on board Sucuri!

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VirusTotal += SecureBrain URL scanner

Some weeks ago I came across gred, the truth is I had never heard of gred before, however, I did know SecureBrain, the company behind gred. I contacted them to see whether they would be interested in introducing their malicious URL dataset in VirusTotal and they made it possible with utmost diligence.

We are extremely grateful to SecureBrain and very excited to announce that they now appear in our URL reports, just as an example:

https://www.virustotal.com/url/e8750c0b772976de6563aa81162fd319256064c76a00e0d46ab5cc5d7ebe1933/analysis/1341229461/

The SecureBrain team describe their service as follows:

Gred Security Service - Web Check
Web Check is an award winning SaaS service to help ensure you web site content is free from malware often injected by Hackers. By keeping your web content free from un-authorized malicious changes, it will help protect your customer when visiting your web site. 

You may read more about their technology at their product description site.

Welcome on board SecureBrain!

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VirusTotal += Sophos URL scanner

Lately we had been introducing many domain characterization datasets/tools in our URL scanning engine, today we are excited to announce that Sophos' fully-fledged URL filtering solution has become part of VirusTotal and will be characterizing both full URLs and domains.

This is an example of the Sophos output with their malicious test domain, do not forget to refer to the additional information section to see the threat information provided:

https://www.virustotal.com/url/d77e1526bbb2941575cd25edfe23bac54caa38969c4d63c9a85f5e09d4d2d01b/analysis/1339745884/

The Sophos team describe their solution as follows:

You can connect your computers to our constantly updated list of millions of infected websites, so your users can’t get to them — even when they're outside your gateway protection. And we keep it updated, adding around 40,000 new sites every day. Sophos Live URL Filtering is included in all of our Endpoint products and suites.  

You may read more about it on their web site.

We would like to give Sophos URL scanner a really warm welcome and thank them for allowing us to keep improving VirusTotal!

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