securelist.com· Sep 21, 2026· by Ahmad Zaidi Said, Elsayed Elrefaei, Kaspersky Security Services

Group Policy hijacked: PAYLOAD ransomware weaponizes Active Directory GPO

Kaspersky GERT experts dive into the technical incident analysis of PAYLOAD ransomware: an encryptionless, binary-less operation that abused Active Directory mechanisms for managing Group Policy Objects.

🎯 Vulnerability: Web Security Vulnerability

💡 Defense Fix: Implement strict input validation, contextual output encoding, and enforce least-privilege authorization controls.

#Data leaks#Ransomware#Data theft#Digital forensics#Incident response#Active directory#Mitre ATT&CK#Group policies

Group Policy hijacked: PAYLOAD ransomware weaponizes Active Directory GPO

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