Apollo Global Management confirmed it was among several financial institutions impacted by a string of social engineering attacks that hit the sector last month, the company said Friday. 

Attackers gained unauthorized access to some of the private equity firm’s cloud platforms between July 6 and July 10, the company said in a data breach notification filed in California. Apollo did not say when or how it became aware of the intrusion and did not respond to a request for comment.

Apollo is the first victim to formally disclose that sensitive personal data under its care was compromised by a wave of attacks that have hit large private equity firms, law firms, financial rating agencies and medical technology companies. 

The company did not name the group responsible for the attack. Yet, Google earlier this month attributed the ongoing campaign to BlackFile, a threat group affiliated with The Com, that recently split its extortion operations across four brands with shared infrastructure: Redact, Pink, Helix and Falcon. 

“Upon detecting the incident, we promptly notified law enforcement, engaged leading outside cybersecurity and forensic experts, enhanced our security protocols, and launched an investigation,” Matthew Breitfelder, global head of human capital at Apollo, wrote in the disclosure notice. 

As part of its ongoing investigation, Apollo said it determined on Aug. 12 that personal data including names, dates of birth, contact information, home addresses and Social Security numbers were compromised. The company did not say how many people were impacted, but noted it’s thus far found no evidence any data was posted online or used for identity theft or fraud.

Apollo is one of the world’s largest private equity firms, with $1.05 trillion in assets under its management at the end of June, according to a regulatory filing.

Researchers previously told CyberScoop some of Apollo’s largest competitors, including Blackstone and Bain Capital, were also targeted with malicious infrastructure, but it’s unclear if those firms were compromised.

BlackFile and its various affiliates have impacted organizations in multiple industries, including healthcare, technology, transportation, logistics, wholesale, and retail and hospitality since the beginning of this year.

The extortion group shifts from one sector to the next, impersonating IT support in voice-phishing and social-engineering attacks before threatening its alleged victims with extortion demands, which often start around $3 million and are typically negotiated down to less than $1 million.

Google researchers also previously said some of the group’s recent victims have been subject to threatening messages and other forms of escalation, including swatting incidents, a tactic adopted by several subsets of The Com.

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A cybercrime group responsible for a string of recent attacks against private equity firms, law firms and financial rating agencies remains active and continued to target new victims as of late last week, according to researchers.

BlackFile, which Google Threat Intelligence Group tracks as UNC6671 and associates more broadly with The Com, has been active since the start of the year, shifting its focus from one sector to the next. 

“We have seen continued targeting against the financial sector with additional targeting of other organizations including in the med tech space,” Austin Larsen, principal threat analyst at GTIG, told CyberScoop.

The extortion group impersonates IT support in voice-phishing and social engineering attacks, and recently split its extortion operations across four brands with shared infrastructure: Redact, Pink, Helix and Falcon.

Several organizations received new extortion demands from Redact in the last week, according to Google. 

BlackFile and its various affiliates have impacted organizations in multiple industries, including healthcare, technology, transportation, logistics, wholesale, retail and hospitality.

“BlackFile does go after some of the largest organizations in the sectors that they go for. They’re not going after small companies,” Larsen said. “This is big-game hunting.”

The group’s extortion demands often start around $3 million and payments, including several in the past few weeks, have typically been negotiated down to less than $1 million, according to Google.

Flashpoint researchers told CyberScoop they have observed malicious infrastructure targeting Blackstone, Bain Capital, Moody’s, CME and Apollo, but it’s unclear if any of those firms were compromised. 

BlackFile’s steady pace of activity underscores the persistent threat it poses, as it targets an average of 1.5 new victims daily, researchers said.

Some of the group’s recent victims have been subject to threatening messages and other forms of escalation, including swatting incidents, a tactic adopted by several subsets of The Com, according to Google. 

The attackers use hundreds of callers, often lower-level people that are recruited for a small fee or an opportunity to earn goodwill with the group, who make the voice phishing calls to obtain initial access. Larsen estimates less than a dozen core operators run the different brands under the BlackFile umbrella.

“From the intrusion data that we’re seeing, this does appear to be essentially the same group,” he said, adding that different people may be operating the various brands, but they’re all linked back to the same threat cluster using shared infrastructure.

Mandiant incident responders encounter BlackFile often, having been engaged by more than two dozen organizations successfully compromised by the threat group since January. New victims in the financial sector were calling Mandiant in for help earlier this month.

Voice-based phishing attacks for data theft extortion aren’t sophisticated or novel, but BlackFile and other cybercrime groups consistently prove their continued effectiveness across virtually any sector or organization. “They’re really hitting on the human weakness element here,” Larsen said.

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