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MITRE ATT&CK® Group

G0021: Molerats

Molerats is an Arabic-speaking, politically-motivated threat group that has been operating since 2012. The group's victims have primarily been in the Middle East, Europe, and the United States.[1][2][3][4]

EnterpriseG0021GroupObject v2.1Modified
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Glexia's Take · Automated analysis

Security context for executives and security teams

Automation confidenceMedium

G0021: Molerats describes [Molerats](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0021) is an Arabic-speaking, politically-motivated threat group that has been operating since 2012. The group's victims have primarily been in the Middle East, Europe, and the United States.(Citation: DustySky)(Citation: DustySky2)(Citation: Kaspersky MoleRATs April 2019)(Citation: Cybereason Molerats Dec 2020)

Executive priority

G0021: Molerats is an official MITRE ATT&CK group. Glexia treats it as defensive behavior context for prioritizing monitoring, control validation, and response planning without using the object by itself as an attribution claim.

Technical view

Security teams should validate G0021: Molerats by reviewing the official ATT&CK relationships, mapped tactics (the mapped ATT&CK tactic context), supported platforms (the platforms named in the official object), and available local telemetry before making detection or mitigation decisions.

Likely telemetry

  • Official ATT&CK relationships and object metadata

Detection direction

  • Validate whether G0021: Molerats appears in your detection coverage and tabletop scenarios.
  • Use the object to align executive risk language with SOC, incident response, and detection engineering work.
  • Do not treat ATT&CK relationship context as attribution without corroborating evidence.

Mitigation priorities

  • Map the object to existing controls and identify missing telemetry or response ownership.
  • Prioritize mitigations that reduce exposure on the listed platforms and tactics.
  • Review adjacent ATT&CK relationships before changing policy, detections, or reporting language.
Additional notes and limits

Baseline Glexia take generated from the official MITRE ATT&CK STIX object, source hash, tactics, platforms, and detection fields. It is safe to replace with a richer model-generated take for the same source hash later.

This baseline take is source-grounded and schema-validated, but it does not include environment-specific telemetry, incident evidence, or threat-intelligence corroboration.

Generated from the cited source records. This long-tail analysis has not been individually reviewed by a named human.

Official MITRE ATT&CK definition

Molerats

Molerats is an Arabic-speaking, politically-motivated threat group that has been operating since 2012. The group's victims have primarily been in the Middle East, Europe, and the United States.[1][2][3][4]

View the same entry on attack.mitre.org (MITRE-hosted reference; in-page links above use the Glexia ATT&CK library.)

Glexia analysis

How security teams should use this page

Treat this object as behavior context, not an attribution claim. Validate the related groups, software, data sources, and mitigations against official ATT&CK relationships and your own telemetry before making control-coverage decisions.

ATT&CK relationship table

Techniques used

This mirrors the MITRE pattern of making group, software, campaign, and technique relationships scannable. Relationship notes come from mirrored ATT&CK relationship text when available.

16 rows
DomainIDNameRelationship / procedure
EnterpriseT1218.007MsiexecSub-technique

Molerats has used msiexec.exe to execute an MSI payload.CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020

EnterpriseT1204.001Malicious LinkSub-technique

Molerats has sent malicious links via email trick users into opening a RAR archive and running an executable.[3]CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020

EnterpriseT1105Ingress Tool Transfer

Molerats used executables to download malicious files from different sources.[3]CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020

EnterpriseT1553.002Code SigningSub-technique

Molerats has used forged Microsoft code-signing certificates on malware.[5]

EnterpriseT1027.015CompressionSub-technique

Molerats has delivered compressed executables within ZIP files to victims.[3]

EnterpriseT1053.005Scheduled TaskSub-technique

Molerats has created scheduled tasks to persistently run VBScripts.CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020

EnterpriseT1140Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information

Molerats decompresses ZIP files once on the victim machine.[3]

EnterpriseT1566.001Spearphishing AttachmentSub-technique

Molerats has sent phishing emails with malicious Microsoft Word and PDF attachments.[3]CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020[4]

EnterpriseT1057Process Discovery

Molerats actors obtained a list of active processes on the victim and sent them to C2 servers.[1]

EnterpriseT1566.002Spearphishing LinkSub-technique

Molerats has sent phishing emails with malicious links included.[3]

EnterpriseT1555.003Credentials from Web BrowsersSub-technique

Molerats used the public tool BrowserPasswordDump10 to dump passwords saved in browsers on victims.[1]

EnterpriseT1547.001Registry Run Keys / Startup FolderSub-technique

Molerats saved malicious files within the AppData and Startup folders to maintain persistence.[3]

EnterpriseT1059.001PowerShellSub-technique

Molerats used PowerShell implants on target machines.[3]

EnterpriseT1059.005Visual BasicSub-technique

Molerats used various implants, including those built with VBScript, on target machines.[3]CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020

EnterpriseT1059.007JavaScriptSub-technique

Molerats used various implants, including those built with JS, on target machines.[3]

EnterpriseT1204.002Malicious FileSub-technique

Molerats has sent malicious files via email that tricked users into clicking Enable Content to run an embedded macro and to download malicious archives.[3]CitationUnit42 Molerat Mar 2020[4]

Associated objects

Groups, software, and campaigns

MalwareEnterprise

S0553: MoleNet

MoleNet is a downloader tool with backdoor capabilities that has been observed in use since at least 2019.[1]

Windows
Relationship explorer

All related ATT&CK context

uses · MalwareS0553: MoleNetEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1218.007: MsiexecEnterpriseuses · MalwareS0543: SparkEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1204.001: Malicious LinkEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1105: Ingress Tool TransferEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1553.002: Code SigningEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1027.015: CompressionEnterpriseuses · MalwareS0062: DustySkyEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1053.005: Scheduled TaskEnterpriseuses · MalwareS0547: DropBookEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1140: Deobfuscate/Decode Files or InformationEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1566.001: Spearphishing AttachmentEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1057: Process DiscoveryEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1566.002: Spearphishing LinkEnterpriseuses · MalwareS0546: SharpStageEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1555.003: Credentials from Web BrowsersEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1547.001: Registry Run Keys / Startup FolderEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1059.001: PowerShellEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1059.005: Visual BasicEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1059.007: JavaScriptEnterpriseuses · TechniqueT1204.002: Malicious FileEnterpriseuses · MalwareS0012: PoisonIvyEnterprise
Change history

Object version and sync metadata

The fields below describe the current mirrored snapshot. When Glexia retains multiple ATT&CK source imports, you can open the table to compare the same object across releases (hashes and MITRE timestamps). For MITRE’s own release notes and roadmap, see ATT&CK resources — Updates.

ATT&CK release
19.2
Object version
2.1
Created
Modified
Raw hash
96fd806c9efebdb0...
Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases(2)
ReleaseBundle importedObject versionModifiedStatusRaw hash
19.22.1Current bundle96fd806c9efe…
19.12.1Older bundle096dac19e8b2…
Raw source

Mirrored ATT&CK source object

The raw object is retained through the mirrored ATT&CK source bundle and object hash. The raw endpoint returns the exact object from the mirrored bundle when available.

Open mirrored raw JSONOpen MITRE-hosted copy
Source references

External references and citations

MITRE external references are preserved separately from Glexia analysis so citations remain traceable to their original source records.

  1. [1]
    DustySky

    ClearSky. (2016, January 7). Operation DustySky. Retrieved January 8, 2016.

    Open source URL
  2. [2]
    DustySky2

    ClearSky Cybersecurity. (2016, June 9). Operation DustySky - Part 2. Retrieved August 3, 2016.

  3. [3]
    Kaspersky MoleRATs April 2019

    GReAT. (2019, April 10). Gaza Cybergang Group1, operation SneakyPastes. Retrieved May 13, 2020.

    Open source URL
  4. [4]
    Cybereason Molerats Dec 2020

    Cybereason Nocturnus Team. (2020, December 9). MOLERATS IN THE CLOUD: New Malware Arsenal Abuses Cloud Platforms in Middle East Espionage Campaign. Retrieved December 22, 2020.

    Open source URL
  5. [5]
    FireEye Operation Molerats

    Villeneuve, N., Haq, H., Moran, N. (2013, August 23). OPERATION MOLERATS: MIDDLE EAST CYBER ATTACKS USING POISON IVY. Retrieved November 17, 2024.

    Open source URL
  6. [6]
    Gaza Cybergang

    (Citation: DustySky)(Citation: Kaspersky MoleRATs April 2019)(Citation: Cybereason Molerats Dec 2020)

  7. [7]
    Molerats

    (Citation: DustySky)

  8. [8]
    Operation Molerats

    (Citation: FireEye Operation Molerats)(Citation: Cybereason Molerats Dec 2020)

  9. [9]
    mitre-attackG0021
    Open source URL
Source and licensing

Source: MITRE ATT&CK®. © 2026 The MITRE Corporation. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of The MITRE Corporation. MITRE ATT&CK and ATT&CK are registered trademarks of The MITRE Corporation. Glexia is not affiliated with or endorsed by MITRE.

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