S1196: Troll Stealer
Troll Stealer is an information stealer written in Go associated with Kimsuky operations. Troll Stealer has typically been delivered through a dropper disguised as a legitimate security program installation file. Troll Stealer features code similar to AppleSeed, also uniquely associated with Kimsuky operations.[1][2]
Security context for executives and security teams
S1196: Troll Stealer describes [Troll Stealer](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S1196) is an information stealer written in Go associated with [Kimsuky](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0094) operations. [Troll Stealer](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S1196) has typically been delivered through a dropper disguised as a legitimate security program installation file. [Troll Stealer](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S1196) features code similar to [AppleSeed](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0622), also uniquely associated with [Kimsuky](http...
Executive priority
S1196: Troll Stealer is an official MITRE ATT&CK software. 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 S1196: Troll Stealer by reviewing the official ATT&CK relationships, mapped tactics (the mapped ATT&CK tactic context), supported platforms (Windows), and available local telemetry before making detection or mitigation decisions.
Likely telemetry
- Official ATT&CK relationships and object metadata
- Network, endpoint, and security-tool telemetry
Detection direction
- Validate whether S1196: Troll Stealer 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.
Troll Stealer
Troll Stealer is an information stealer written in Go associated with Kimsuky operations. Troll Stealer has typically been delivered through a dropper disguised as a legitimate security program installation file. Troll Stealer features code similar to AppleSeed, also uniquely associated with Kimsuky operations.[1][2]
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.
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.
| Domain | ID | Name | Relationship / procedure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enterprise | T1005 | Data from Local System | Troll Stealer gathers information from infected systems such as SSH information from the victim's `.ssh` directory.[2] Troll Stealer collects information from local FileZilla installations and Microsoft Sticky Note.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1074.001 | Local Data StagingSub-technique | Troll Stealer encrypts gathered information on victim devices prior to exfiltrating it through command and control infrastructure.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1113 | Screen Capture | Troll Stealer can capture screenshots from victim machines.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1132.001 | Standard EncodingSub-technique | Troll Stealer performs XOR encryption and Base64 encoding of data prior to sending to command and control infrastructure.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1027.002 | Software PackingSub-technique | Troll Stealer has been delivered as a VMProtect-packed binary.[1]CitationASEC Troll Stealer 2024 |
| Enterprise | T1016 | System Network Configuration Discovery | Troll Stealer collects the MAC address of victim devices.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1071.001 | Web ProtocolsSub-technique | Troll Stealer uses HTTP to communicate to command and control infrastructure.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1059.001 | PowerShellSub-technique | Troll Stealer creates and executes a PowerShell script to delete itself.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1553.002 | Code SigningSub-technique | Troll Stealer, along with its associated dropper, utilizes legitimate, stolen code signing certificates.[1]CitationASEC Troll Stealer 2024 |
| Enterprise | T1059.003 | Windows Command ShellSub-technique | Troll Stealer can create and execute Windows batch scripts.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1036.005 | Match Legitimate Resource Name or LocationSub-technique | Troll Stealer is typically installed via a dropper file that masquerades as a legitimate security program installation file.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1552.004 | Private KeysSub-technique | Troll Stealer collects all data in victim `.ssh` folders by creating a compressed copy that is subsequently exfiltrated to command and control infrastructure. Troll Stealer also collects key information associated with the Government Public Key Infrastructure (GPKI) service for South Korean government information systems.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1560 | Archive Collected Data | Troll Stealer compresses stolen data prior to exfiltration.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1213 | Data from Information Repositories | Troll Stealer gathers information from the Government Public Key Infrastructure (GPKI) folder, associated with South Korean government public key infrastructure, on infected systems.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1083 | File and Directory Discovery | Troll Stealer can enumerate and collect items from local drives and folders.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1480.002 | Mutual ExclusionSub-technique | Troll Stealer creates a mutex during installation to prevent duplicate execution.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1082 | System Information Discovery | Troll Stealer can collect local system information.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1218.011 | Rundll32Sub-technique | Troll Stealer is dropped as a DLL file and executed via `rundll32.exe` by its installer.[1]CitationASEC Troll Stealer 2024 |
| Enterprise | T1041 | Exfiltration Over C2 Channel | Troll Stealer exfiltrates collected information to its command and control infrastructure.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1217 | Browser Information Discovery | Troll Stealer collects information from Chromium-based browsers and Firefox such as cookies, history, downloads, and extensions.[1][2] |
| Enterprise | T1573.001 | Symmetric CryptographySub-technique | Troll Stealer encrypts data sent to command and control infrastructure using a combination of RC4 and RSA-4096 algorithms.[1] |
| Enterprise | T1070.004 | File DeletionSub-technique | Troll Stealer creates and can execute a BAT script that will delete the malware.[1] |
Groups, software, and campaigns
G0094: Kimsuky
Kimsuky is a Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK)-based cyber espionage group that has been active since at least 2012. The group initially targeted South Korean government agencies, think tanks, and subject-matter experts in various fields. Its operations expanded to include the United Nations and organizations in the government, education, business services, and manufacturing sectors across the United States, Japan, Russia, and Europe. Kimsuky has focused collection on foreign policy and national security issues tied to the Korean Peninsula, nuclear policy, and sanctions. Kimsuky operations have overlapped with those of other North Korean state-sponsored cyber espionage actors as a result of ad hoc collaborations or other limited resource sharing.[1][2][3][4][5][6]
Kimsuky was assessed to be responsible for the 2014 Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co. compromise; other notable campaigns include Operation STOLEN PENCIL (2018), Operation Kabar Cobra (2019), and Operation Smoke Screen (2019).[7][8][9] In 2023, Kimsuky was observed using commercial large language models (LLMs) to assist with vulnerability research, scripting, social engineering and reconnaissance.[10]
DPRK threat actor cluster boundaries overlap in open source reporting, with some security researchers consolidating all attributed North Korean state-sponsored cyber activity under Lazarus Group, rather than tracking operationally distinct subgroups.
All related ATT&CK context
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.
Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases(2)
| Release | Bundle imported | Object version | Modified | Status | Raw hash |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19.2 | 1.0 | Current bundle | d8b3d298507f… | ||
| 19.1 | 1.0 | Older bundle | d8b3d298507f… |
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.
External references and citations
MITRE external references are preserved separately from Glexia analysis so citations remain traceable to their original source records.
- [1]S2W Troll Stealer 2024
Jiho Kim & Sebin Lee, S2W. (2024, February 7). Kimsuky disguised as a Korean company signed with a valid certificate to distribute Troll Stealer (English ver.). Retrieved January 17, 2025.
Open source URL - [2]Symantec Troll Stealer 2024
Symantec Threat Hunter Team. (2024, May 16). Springtail: New Linux Backdoor Added to Toolkit. Retrieved January 17, 2025.
Open source URL - [3]mitre-attackS1196Open source URL
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