Beazley Security Q1 2026 Report Highlights Supply Chain Attacks and Credential-Driven Ransomware
Report discovered via Awesome Annual Security Reports.
Summary
Beazley Security's Q1 2026 report links 74% of investigated ransomware intrusions to compromised remote-access credentials, details TeamPCP's supply chain campaign, and reports a 43% quarterly rise in CISA KEV additions.
Key points
- Compromised credentials used against VPN, RDP, and VDI services accounted for 74% of ransomware intrusions Beazley Security investigated; some operators pursued data theft and extortion without encryption.
- The report traces TeamPCP's campaign from misconfigured GitHub Actions and incomplete credential rotation at Trivy to poisoned Checkmarx KICS, LiteLLM, and more than 66 additional packages.
- The report records 15,243 newly published CVEs and 40 additions to CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog in Q1, increases of 18.5% and 42.9% respectively over Q4 2025.
- Public reporting cited by Beazley describes attackers abusing Microsoft Intune remote wipe capabilities at Stryker, affecting more than 200,000 systems. Iran-linked Handala claimed responsibility.
- Vendor impersonation and compromised vendor accounts led BEC entry methods. Approximately 53% of investigated BEC cases involved organizations reporting full or partial MFA enforcement.
- MDR telemetry showed renewed ClickFix and SEO poisoning activity delivering malicious commands or installers directly to endpoints, reinforcing the need for controls beyond browser and perimeter defenses.
- Criminal-forum monitoring found AI tools advertised for web application testing and prioritizing stolen data for extortion. The report recommends rapid patching, forensic validation after exploitation exposure, and layered defenses.
Article Details
- Publisher
- Beazley Security
- Report Period
- 2026-01-01 to 2026-03-31
- Scope
- Threat research, vulnerability disclosures, ransomware and BEC investigations, criminal-market monitoring, and MDR telemetry.
- Sample Size
- Not disclosed
- Key Statistics
- NIST published 15,243 new CVEs in Q1 2026, an 18.5% increase over Q4 2025.
- CISA added 40 vulnerabilities to its KEV catalog in Q1 2026, a 42.9% increase over Q4 2025.
- Compromised credentials combined with exposed remote access services accounted for 74% of ransomware intrusions investigated by Beazley Security in Q1 2026.
- Approximately 53% of BEC cases handled by Beazley Security involved organizations reporting fully or partially enforced MFA for email access.
- Nearly 32% of BEC incidents with confirmable transactional outcomes resulted in fraudulent transfers.
- Recommendations
- Patch critical vulnerabilities within hours of public disclosure; where systems were exposed during active exploitation, perform forensic review rather than treating patching alone as sufficient remediation.
- Pin external GitHub Actions and package dependencies to specific Git commit SHA hashes rather than mutable version tags.
- Treat environments that ran affected Trivy components or installed LiteLLM during the March 2026 exposure windows as potentially compromised and rotate all CI/CD secrets and cloud credentials.
- Protect global administrator credentials with phishing-resistant MFA and Privileged Identity Management; restrict remote wipe privileges, require secondary approval, and alert on bulk device-management commands.
- Audit incomplete MFA deployment and conditional-access exceptions, and maintain strong endpoint detection and endpoint policies against ClickFix and malicious installer delivery.
MITRE ATT&CK
T1078.004 · Cloud AccountsAttackers reused stolen cloud credentials, including an AWS API key used against the European Commission and administrative credentials used in Stryker's Microsoft Entra environment.T1114 · Email CollectionBEC intrusions accessed and manipulated inboxes and collected sensitive financial and proprietary messages.T1190 · Exploit Public-Facing ApplicationCVE-2025-53521 was observed being exploited for initial access through F5 Big-IP APM.T1195.002 · Compromise Software Supply ChainTeamPCP poisoned trusted scanner releases, GitHub Actions tags, and downstream packages to distribute credential-stealing malware.T1204 · User ExecutionClickFix attacks persuaded users to paste and execute malicious commands, while PDF-themed lures induced malicious installer downloads.T1485 · Data DestructionPublic reporting describes attackers abusing Microsoft Intune remote wipe functionality to destroy data across Stryker systems.T1528 · Steal Application Access TokenThe supply chain attacks stole GitHub personal access tokens, a PyPI publishing token, Kubernetes tokens, and other API credentials.T1539 · Steal Web Session CookieThe report describes phishing kits designed to steal authenticated sessions despite MFA.T1552.004 · Private KeysTeamPCP Cloud Stealer harvested SSH keys from compromised CI/CD environments.T1557 · Adversary-in-the-MiddleAiTM phishing kits placed reverse proxies between victims and legitimate login pages to intercept authentication attempts.T1566.001 · Spearphishing AttachmentVendor-impersonation emails directed victims to malicious attachments.T1566.002 · Spearphishing LinkBEC attackers impersonated vendors and directed recipients to credential-harvesting sites.T1572 · Protocol TunnelingThe Trivy stealer exfiltrated encrypted credentials through an attacker-controlled Cloudflare Tunnel to blend into developer traffic.
CVE
People
Threat Actors
AkiraRansomware group with 191 leak-site posts observed in Q1.Banished KittenTracking name explicitly identified for Handala, the Iran-linked group claiming the Stryker attack; also tracked as Red Sandstorm.HandalaClaimed responsibility for the destructive Stryker attack; researchers link the group to Iran's MOIS. The report identifies Red Sandstorm and Banished Kitten as tracking names for the group.INCRansomware operators associated with an uptick in cases observed by Beazley Security.InterlockRansomware operators associated with an uptick in cases observed by Beazley Security.LAPSUS$Published stolen Checkmarx data and claimed approximately four terabytes of data stolen from Mercor; Checkmarx confirmed its leaked data originated from its GitHub environment.QilinRansomware group with 419 public victim posts observed in Q1; leak-site posts are not confirmation of individual incidents.Red SandstormTracking name explicitly identified for Handala, the Iran-linked group claiming the Stryker attack; also tracked as Banished Kitten.TeamPCPConducted the developer supply chain compromises affecting Trivy, Checkmarx, LiteLLM, and downstream organizations; announced a ransomware partnership with Vect.The GentlemenRansomware group with 210 leak-site posts observed in Q1.VectRansomware operation that partnered with TeamPCP to target organizations using credentials stolen through supply chain compromises.
Malware
Lumma StealerThis multi-agency international enforcement significantly disrupted the operations of the Lumma Stealer and Rhadamanthys malware families, creating an opportunity for StealC and Vidar to fill demand.RhadamanthysThis multi-agency international enforcement significantly disrupted the operations of the Lumma Stealer and Rhadamanthys malware families, creating an opportunity for StealC and Vidar to fill demand.StealCThis multi-agency international enforcement significantly disrupted the operations of the Lumma Stealer and Rhadamanthys malware families, creating an opportunity for StealC and Vidar to fill demand.TeamPCP Cloud stealerof the Trivy scanner. The group published a backdoored Trivy binary that included malware called "TeamPCP Cloud Stealer" to GitHub Releases, Docker Hub, and several other repositories followed by additional maliciousVect 2.0BSL gained insider access to the Vect 2.0 ransomware affiliate panel and observed Vect's partnership with TeamPCP as announced publicly on BreachForums.VidarThis multi-agency international enforcement significantly disrupted the operations of the Lumma Stealer and Rhadamanthys malware families, creating an opportunity for StealC and Vidar to fill demand.
Vendors
Anthropic- [Anthropic Mythos and the Accelerating AI Vulnerability Discovery Trend](#anthropic-mythos-and-the-accelerating-ai-vulnerability-discovery-trend)Aqua Securityactor group TeamPCP used an AI-assisted bot called hackerbot-claw to gain an initial foothold into Aqua Security's Trivy vulnerability scanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS securityBerriAIBerriAI, LiteLLM's creator, used Trivy for security scanning in their own CI pipeline, and when the poisoned trivy-action ran in the environment, it was able to exfiltrate the PyPI publishing token for the LiteLLMCheckmarxinto Aqua Security's Trivy vulnerability scanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS security scanner, the LiteLLM AI library, and more than 66 additional software packages.F5- **Stolen F5 Big-IP APM vulnerabilities weaponized**: Chinese state-affiliated threat actors continued to capitalize on the October 2025 F5 corporate breach covered in our Q4 report. Our BSL advisory published at theIvanti- **Ivanti vulnerabilities reported in EPM and EPMM**: Ivanti reported critical vulnerabilities in both their Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM) and Endpoint Manager (EPM) products in Q1. Both products are commonly foundMicrosoft- [Iran-Linked Handala Group Abuses Microsoft Intune to Destroy Data](#iran-linked-handala-group-abuses-microsoft-intune-to-destroy-data)
Products
Axiosat Cisco, the European Commission, and AI startup Mercor. Separately, the popular JavaScript package Axios was compromised in late March in a targeted supply chain attack attributed to a distinct threat actor,BIG-IP APM- **Stolen F5 Big-IP APM vulnerabilities weaponized**: Chinese state-affiliated threat actors continued to capitalize on the October 2025 F5 corporate breach covered in our Q4 report. Our BSL advisory published at theEndpoint Managervulnerabilities reported in EPM and EPMM**: Ivanti reported critical vulnerabilities in both their Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM) and Endpoint Manager (EPM) products in Q1. Both products are commonly found deployedIvanti Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM)reported in EPM and EPMM**: Ivanti reported critical vulnerabilities in both their Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM) and Endpoint Manager (EPM) products in Q1. Both products are commonly found deployed asKICSAqua Security's Trivy vulnerability scanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS security scanner, the LiteLLM AI library, and more than 66 additional software packages.LiteLLMscanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS security scanner, the LiteLLM AI library, and more than 66 additional software packages.Microsoft EntraThe group gained administrative access to Stryker's Microsoft Entra environment and weaponized Microsoft Intune's remote wipe functionality, destroying data across more than 200,000 systems and 79 offices worldwide.Microsoft Intune- [Iran-Linked Handala Group Abuses Microsoft Intune to Destroy Data](#iran-linked-handala-group-abuses-microsoft-intune-to-destroy-data)Mythos- [Anthropic Mythos and the Accelerating AI Vulnerability Discovery Trend](#anthropic-mythos-and-the-accelerating-ai-vulnerability-discovery-trend)Notepad++high-value target across multiple adversary groups. Additionally, the popular text editing application Notepad++ disclosed that their update infrastructure was compromised by an advanced persistent threat (APT) with aTrivyTeamPCP used an AI-assisted bot called hackerbot-claw to gain an initial foothold into Aqua Security's Trivy vulnerability scanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS security scanner,
Tools
CyberGymFor example, the Mythos model scored 83.1% on CyberGym's vulnerability reproduction benchmark as compared to 66.6% for Opus 4.6, a considerable leap in performance from Anthropic's prior leading model.EvilginxModern kits such as Evilginx are designed to clone legitimate login pages like Okta, M365, and Google and can be highly effective when paired with vishing impersonations.hackerbot-clawThreat actor group TeamPCP used an AI-assisted bot called hackerbot-claw to gain an initial foothold into Aqua Security's Trivy vulnerability scanner, then used stolen credentials to spread across Checkmarx's KICS
Countries
Iran- [Iran-Linked Handala Group Abuses Microsoft Intune to Destroy Data](#iran-linked-handala-group-abuses-microsoft-intune-to-destroy-data)United Statesrepositories stolen, including source code for AI-powered products and customer code belonging to banks and US government agencies. CERT-EU separately confirmed the European Commission fell victim to the attack, with
Industries
business servicesWith a significant drop in reported incidents impacting Business Services, Manufacturing and Distribution rose to second on our list, with an increase in reporting from 11% to 15%.Financial institutionsProfessional Services and Financial Institutions accounted for a combined 37% of cases we investigated, representing the largest distribution this quarter.HealthcareReporting of incident distribution in other sectors remained mostly consistent, except for Healthcare declining from 15% to 10%.Manufacturing and DistributionWith a significant drop in reported incidents impacting Business Services, Manufacturing and Distribution rose to second on our list, with an increase in reporting from 11% to 15%.Professional ServicesProfessional Services took over as the most targeted sector in Q1, representing 21% of observed ransomware incidents, up from 16% in Q4 2025.