MetaMask

Censys Exposes DarkSword iOS Exploit Platform and Coruna Crypto Wallet Stealer

Censys has disclosed the inner workings of DarkSword, a commercial platform that sells remote access to iOS devices, along with its associated malware Coruna that targets cryptocurrency wallet recovery keys. The infrastructure was exposed between September 15 and 17, allowing researchers to analyze the full attack chain starting from a WebKit and JavaScriptCore exploit delivered through the browser. After escaping the Safari sandbox and reaching the kernel, the platform deploys three layers including a flag, controller, and main implant. Coruna then scans the device for BIP39-compliant seed phrases stored in photos and Apple Notes across 19 targeted wallet applications such as MetaMask, Phantom, Trust Wallet, Coinbase, Exodus, imToken, Bitpie, and BitKeep. The exposed server contained 11 victim recovery keys, 179 directories of extracted data, and 75 operator accounts, indicating a structured commercial operation with agent accounts, commissions, and device quotas. Confirmed infections affect devices running iOS 16.1 and 16.3.1, while Apple has extended patches to additional iOS 18 devices. Maintaining updated iOS versions remains the primary defense against this threat.

Address Substitution Attacks Exploit Partial Address Checks in Crypto Wallets

Address poisoning, clipboard hijackers, and supply-chain malware all rely on users verifying only the first and last few characters of long blockchain addresses. Researchers detail real incidents including a May 2024 theft of 1,155 WBTC worth roughly 68 million dollars where an attacker poisoned transaction history after a test transfer. Studies from Carnegie Mellon University show that even security-conscious users miss mismatches in truncated addresses 21 to 38 percent of the time. Existing identicons such as Jazzicon and Blockies can be matched by attackers because they depend on only the first eight hex characters. The team released the open-source Humanized Hash library that renders any address or hash as a 4x4 grid of colored shapes using PBKDF2 stretching, making forgery computationally expensive. Calculations indicate that matching both the visual pattern and edge characters requires tens to millions of GPU-years on current hardware. The library supports multiple languages with identical output and carries an MIT license with a fixed algorithm.