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Threat actor

Cobalt Group

Last fetched

Cobalt Group is a threat actor tracked in WhisperGraph's MITRE ATT&CK corpus, observed using 34 techniques and also known as 3 other names.

Also known as

GOLD KINGSWOOD, Cobalt Gang, Cobalt Spider

Description

[Cobalt Group](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0080) is a financially motivated threat group that has primarily targeted financial institutions since at least 2016. The group has conducted intrusions to steal money via targeting ATM systems, card processing, payment systems and SWIFT systems. [Cobalt Group](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0080) has mainly targeted banks in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia. One of the alleged leaders was arrested in Spain in early 2018, but the group still appears to be active. The group has been known to target organizations in order to use their access to then compromise additional victims.(Citation: Talos Cobalt Group July 2018)(Citation: PTSecurity Cobalt Group Aug 2017)(Citation: PTSecurity Cobalt Dec 2016)(Citation: Group IB Cobalt Aug 2017)(Citation: Proofpoint Cobalt June 2017)(Citation: RiskIQ Cobalt Nov 2017)(Citation: RiskIQ Cobalt Jan 2018) Reporting indicates there may be links between [Cobalt Group](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0080) and both the malware [Carbanak](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0030) and the group [Carbanak](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0008).(Citation: Europol Cobalt Mar 2018)

Techniques by tactic

Command and Control

Discovery

Execution

Initial Access

Lateral Movement

Persistence

Privilege Escalation

Resource Development

Stealth

Attributed infrastructure

None published. WhisperGraph carries no ATTRIBUTED_TO edge to Cobalt Group today — this states the absence of a published link, not that Cobalt Group has no infrastructure.

References

© The MITRE Corporation. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of The MITRE Corporation.

Related pages

Pivot from Cobalt Group into its techniques, tactics and any attributed infrastructure.

Queries

Resolves the slug to this actor, merging every duplicate node sharing the same name.


MATCH (a:ACTOR)
WHERE a.name =~ $pattern OR any(x IN a.aliases WHERE x =~ $pattern)
RETURN a.id AS id, a.name AS name, a.aliases AS aliases, a.description AS description,
       a.references AS references, a.campaigns AS campaigns
LIMIT 25
Run yourself →

Techniques this actor uses, grouped by the tactic each one serves.


MATCH (a:ACTOR {name: $name})-[:USES_TECHNIQUE]->(t:ATTACK_PATTERN)
OPTIONAL MATCH (t)-[:USES_TACTIC]->(tac:ATTACK_PATTERN)
RETURN t.id AS techniqueId, t.name AS techniqueName, tac.id AS tacticId, tac.name AS tacticName
LIMIT 1000
Run yourself →

Infrastructure publicly attributed to this actor.


MATCH (n)-[:ATTRIBUTED_TO]->(a:ACTOR {name: $name})
RETURN labels(n)[0] AS kind, n.name AS name
LIMIT 25
Run yourself →

Or query Whisper from your own LLM workflow via the Whisper MCP server.