Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app — Dual-Platform Delivery: Windows Electron/Inno Setup PowerShell-stdin Loader & macOS Atomic Stealer (AMOS) With Ledger/Trezor Wallet Replacement

Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app (TL-2026-0614), also tracked as openew.app fake ChatGPT campaign, is a high-severity malware campaign, first published 2026-05-28. It has no confirmed attribution, affects Microsoft Windows, maps to 26 MITRE ATT&CK techniques (T1005, T1027, T1036), and is covered by 9 detection rules and 21 indicators of compromise.

Key facts for TL-2026-0614

Threat ID
TL-2026-0614
Also known as
openew.app fake ChatGPT campaign, ChatGPT typosquat AMOS dropper, LeronApplication loader
Severity
HIGH
Status
ACTIVE
Category
MALWARE
First published
2026-05-28
Last reviewed
2026-05-28
Attribution confidence
NONE
Motivation
FINANCIAL
Target sectors
consumer, technology, cryptocurrency, financial, software development, media
Target regions
Global, North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific
Detection rules
9
Indicators of compromise
21

Malware and tooling in Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

Malware and tooling: AMOS, Atomic Stealer, Custom PHP handler (laravel.php), Electron, Inno Setup

A typosquat impersonation site at openew[.]app, mimicking the OpenAI ChatGPT download page, fingerprints visitor OS and serves architecture-specific malware. Windows visitors receive Chat_GPT.exe — an Inno Setup installer that drops an Electron skeleton (EApp.exe) under %APPDATA%\LeronApplication and spawns PowerShell with -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -Command - to execute commands read from stdin (fileless), beaconing to 188.137.246.189 via /laravel.php?api=api&hash=...&message=... endpoints. macOS visitors receive ChatGpt.dmg containing Atomic Stealer (AMOS), which runs a long AppleScript chain: silent dscl-based password validation, a fake ''Please enter device password to continue'' prompt, keychain copy, theft from 12 Chromium browsers plus Firefox/Waterfox (cookies, logins), Telegram session theft, enumeration of 16 cryptocurrency wallet directories (Ledger Live, Trezor Suite, Exodus, Electrum, Sparrow, etc.), recursive harvest of .wallet/.seed/.key/.kdbx files from Desktop/Documents, and trojanized in-place replacement of Ledger Live, Ledger Wallet, and Trezor Suite via sudo (using captured credentials) or rm -rf fallback. Distribution is consistent with search-ad poisoning, SEO poisoning, YouTube spam, and AI-focused Discord/Telegram lure communities.

How Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app works

On 2026-05-28 Malwarebytes researcher Stefan Dasic disclosed an active dual-platform malware delivery campaign using the typosquat domain openew[.]app, a brand-impersonation page styled after the legitimate ChatGPT download landing page. The site performs server-side or client-side OS fingerprinting and serves a Windows Chat_GPT.exe to Windows visitors and a macOS ChatGpt.dmg to macOS visitors. Both payloads ultimately exist to steal credentials, browser data, and cryptocurrency wallet contents, with the macOS variant going further by replacing genuine Ledger and Trezor desktop apps with trojanized builds to capture seed phrases and recovery material going forward.

WINDOWS CHAIN (Chat_GPT.exe → EApp.exe → PowerShell stdin loader): The Windows payload Chat_GPT.exe (SHA-256 c9e0e6985dca3a179c9bdea4e7b38f7dc57fe00ecedc2fd634256fc53bf2de2d) is an Inno Setup installer — a legitimate free installer toolkit widely used by software vendors, here repurposed to lower static detection. The installer extracts an Electron application skeleton into %APPDATA%\LeronApplication, including a renamed Electron host EApp.exe and supporting Node.js / V8 resources. EApp.exe is run after install. Rather than carrying malicious payload bytes on disk, EApp.exe spawns PowerShell with the command line ''powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -Command -''. The trailing single ''-'' to -Command instructs PowerShell to read the script body from standard input. EApp.exe writes the actual malicious PowerShell code into that stdin handle, so the malicious script never touches disk in a form that AV file scanners or EDR file-write hooks can trivially inspect. This is a fileless / living-off-the-land delivery pattern that defeats most signature-based AV: at the time of Malwarebytes analysis only 9 of 69 antivirus engines on a public multiscanner detected Chat_GPT.exe. The PowerShell stage performs command-and-control over HTTP to 188.137.246.189 using a /laravel.php endpoint with query parameters api=api, hash={value}, and message={value} — a hand-rolled PHP-handler C2 design typical of low-tier commodity stealers and dropper services rather than off-the-shelf C2 frameworks (BeaconBeagle lookups against 188.137.246.189 and openew.app returned no Cobalt Strike / Sliver / Mythic / Brute Ratel beacon or config matches as of 2026-05-28). Additional infrastructure observed in the campaign includes 192.253.248.181 and 172.94.9.250. Persistence on Windows is established via standard Run-key / Startup-folder mechanisms typical of the Electron-skeleton loader pattern.

MACOS CHAIN (ChatGpt.dmg → Atomic Stealer AppleScript chain → wallet trojanization): The macOS payload ChatGpt.dmg (SHA-256 c0919e1999eaee67e67aeda0287722775afb04e9a9a0f727928b4d11265fb70b) drops Atomic Stealer (AMOS), an established macOS infostealer-as-a-service tracked since April 2023. Pricing has reportedly settled around $3,000/month in cryptocurrency, indicating a financially motivated operator with the budget to subscribe to a polished MaaS rather than build from scratch. AMOS is implemented primarily as a long AppleScript chain executed by osascript, a pattern that lets the malware abuse OS-level scripting privileges to drive the GUI, query system directories, and orchestrate sudo. The execution sequence is: (1) silent password validation using ''dscl . -authonly $USER $candidate'' against any password the user has already typed elsewhere in the session or any default candidates; (2) if no valid password is on hand, display a native-styled dialog prompt reading ''Please enter device password to continue'' — visually indistinguishable from a legitimate macOS authentication prompt; (3) revalidate the typed password with dscl until a correct one is captured (T1056.002 GUI Input Capture combined with T1078 Valid Accounts); (4) copy the user keychain (login.keychain-db) and any iCloud Keychain data accessible via security CLI, exfiltrating cleartext via the captured password (T1555.001); (5) iterate 12 Chromium-based browsers (Chrome, Edge, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, Arc, Yandex, etc.) plus Firefox and Waterfox, copying Cookies, Login Data, autofill, and credit-card stores (T1555.003, T1539); (6) copy Telegram tdata / session files (T1539 session hijack); (7) enumerate 16 cryptocurrency wallet directories — Ledger Live, Trezor Suite, Exodus, Electrum, Sparrow, MyMonero, Coinomi, Atomic, Wasabi, Guarda, Jaxx Liberty, Binance, BitPay, Trust, Mycelium, Argent — and recursively scan ~/Desktop and ~/Documents for files matching .wallet, .seed, .key, and .kdbx extensions (T1083, T1005); (8) trojanize Ledger Live, Ledger Wallet, and Trezor Suite by removing the legitimate /Applications/ bundle (using sudo rm -rf with the captured password where possible, falling back to a non-privileged rm -rf of any user-writable copies) and substituting a backdoored build supplied by the operator (T1554 Compromise Host Software Binary). The trojanized wallet apps are the long-tail payoff: they sit on the victim machine forever capturing seed phrases, PINs, and transaction approvals every time the victim opens what they think is their hardware-wallet companion app. (9) Compress harvested data and exfiltrate to a hardcoded operator server.

DISTRIBUTION: No specific traffic-source telemetry was published in the disclosure, but the surrounding signal — typosquat .app TLD (the .app TLD forces HTTPS at the registry level, giving a green padlock that consumers read as trust), brand impersonation of ChatGPT, dual-platform fingerprinting, and AMOS payload — fits the documented in-the-wild distribution pattern for the AMOS ecosystem: paid search ads against ''ChatGPT download'' / ''download chatgpt mac'' queries, SEO-poisoned YouTube video descriptions, fake review/comparison blog posts, and links posted into AI-focused Discord and Telegram communities. The operator targets the rapidly growing search surface for ''ChatGPT download'' from non-technical consumers and developers who don''t know that ChatGPT is delivered via OpenAI''s own openai.com / chat.openai.com / chatgpt.com domains.

RELATIONSHIP TO PRIOR THREATS: Distinct from prior AMOS ClickFix variants (TL-2026-0336, TL-2026-0471) which used fake CAPTCHA / ''verify you are human'' lure pages, and distinct from the OpenClaw skill supply-chain compromise (TL-2026-0136). This entry tracks the openew[.]app fake-download infrastructure specifically; the AMOS payload itself is a recurring family.

IMPACT: Full credential compromise of any account password stored in macOS keychain (often hundreds), cleartext extraction of all saved browser credentials and session cookies (enabling MFA-bypass session-replay attacks against email, GitHub, AWS, banking), and — uniquely impactful — persistent compromise of cryptocurrency hardware wallets via trojanized companion-app replacement. On Windows the immediate impact is data theft via fileless PowerShell C2, with persistent foothold for follow-on payload delivery.

MITRE ATT&CK techniques used in TL-2026-0614

Collection

T1005 Data from Local System; T1560 Archive Collected Data

Defense Evasion

T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information; T1036 Masquerading; T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information

Exfiltration

T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel; T1567 Exfiltration Over Web Service

Credential Access

T1056 Input Capture; T1539 Steal Web Session Cookie; T1552 Unsecured Credentials; T1555 Credentials from Password Stores

Execution

T1059 Command and Scripting Interpreter; T1204 User Execution

Command and Control

T1071 Application Layer Protocol

Discovery

T1082 System Information Discovery; T1083 File and Directory Discovery; T1217 Browser Information Discovery

Initial Access

T1189 Drive-by Compromise

Persistence

T1547 Boot or Logon Autostart Execution; T1554 Compromise Host Software Binary

Privilege Escalation

T1548 Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism

Resource Development

T1583 Acquire Infrastructure; T1588 Obtain Capabilities; T1608 Stage Capabilities

Impact

T1657 Financial Theft

defense-impairment

T1685 Disable or Modify Tools

Affected products and versions in Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

  • Microsoft — Windows
    Vulnerable versions: 10; 11; Server 2019; Server 2022
  • Apple — macOS
    Vulnerable versions: 12 Monterey; 13 Ventura; 14 Sonoma; 15 Sequoia
  • Ledger — Ledger Live
    Vulnerable versions: all macOS builds susceptible to replacement
  • Ledger — Ledger Wallet
    Vulnerable versions: all macOS builds susceptible to replacement
  • SatoshiLabs — Trezor Suite
    Vulnerable versions: all macOS builds susceptible to replacement

Remediation for Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

Immediate actions

  • Block openew[.]app at DNS / web proxy / endpoint web filter
  • Block egress to 188.137.246.189, 192.253.248.181, and 172.94.9.250 at perimeter and host firewall
  • Block Chat_GPT.exe SHA-256 c9e0e6985dca3a179c9bdea4e7b38f7dc57fe00ecedc2fd634256fc53bf2de2d and ChatGpt.dmg SHA-256 c0919e1999eaee67e67aeda0287722775afb04e9a9a0f727928b4d11265fb70b in EDR file-execution allowlist
  • Quarantine any process tree where a non-Microsoft Electron .exe spawns powershell.exe with -Command -
  • Hunt for the file path %APPDATA%\LeronApplication on Windows fleet and isolate any matches
  • On macOS fleet, hunt for osascript invocations containing ''dscl . -authonly'' and for AppleScript-driven dialogs whose default prompt text contains ''Please enter device password to continue''
  • Force-rotate all credentials stored in macOS keychain on any host suspected of execution: SSO, email, source control (GitHub/GitLab), cloud (AWS/GCP/Azure), VPN, password manager master passwords

Workarounds

  • If hardware-wallet companion apps cannot be re-installed cleanly, perform a full OS reinstall before reconnecting any hardware wallet; treat any seed phrase typed into a potentially trojanized Ledger Live / Trezor Suite as compromised and move funds to a freshly initialized seed on a clean device

Longer-term hardening

  • Deploy macOS EDR with AppleScript / osascript behavioral telemetry — not just file-based detection — since AMOS lives almost entirely in script
  • Roll out hardware-key (FIDO2/WebAuthn) MFA on all critical SaaS to neutralize session-cookie replay from Chromium/Firefox cookie theft
  • Maintain an internal allowlist of approved AI tooling and block lookalike domains via DNS/RPZ; treat the .app TLD with elevated scrutiny in URL category lists
  • Enforce code-signing / notarization checks for /Applications/Ledger Live.app, /Applications/Ledger Wallet.app, and /Applications/Trezor Suite.app via MDM file-integrity policy
  • Deploy ASR (Attack Surface Reduction) rule on Windows: block Office/Electron child processes from launching PowerShell, or block PowerShell with -Command - from stdin
  • User education: ChatGPT is served from chatgpt.com / openai.com — there is no separate desktop installer distributed via a third-party .app domain

Weaknesses (CWE) in Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

CWE-829, CWE-494, CWE-506, CWE-78

Timeline of Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

  • Atomic Stealer (AMOS) first publicly documented as a macOS infostealer-as-a-service, initially priced at approximately $1,000/month and distributed via underground forums.
  • AMOS distribution evolves to include ClickFix / fake-CAPTCHA lure pages and PowerShell paste-and-run social engineering; subscription pricing rises to approximately $3,000/month.
  • Threadlinqs Intelligence tracks prior AMOS variants TL-2026-0336 and TL-2026-0471 (ClickFix delivery), establishing baseline TTPs for the family.
  • openew[.]app fake ChatGPT download infrastructure observed serving dual-platform payloads (Chat_GPT.exe to Windows, ChatGpt.dmg to macOS) with active C2 to 188.137.246.189.
  • Threadlinqs Intelligence publishes TL-2026-0614 advisory with full MITRE mapping, exploit chain analysis, and detection coverage.
  • Malwarebytes researcher Stefan Dasic publishes public disclosure of the openew[.]app campaign with full IOC set: domain, three C2 IPs, two SHA-256 hashes, install path %APPDATA%\LeronApplication, and /laravel.php C2 URL pattern.
  • As of 2026-05-29, the openew[.]app fake-ChatGPT campaign (Windows fileless loader + macOS AMOS/Odyssey Stealer with Ledger/Trezor trojanization) is freshly disclosed (Malwarebytes, 2026-05-28) with no reported takedown of the domain or three C2 IPs. The underlying AMOS MaaS remains one of the most active macOS threats (120+ countries, parallel fake-tool campaigns), so this stays a live, ongoing threat.

Sources cited for Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

Threats related to Fake ChatGPT Download Site openew[.]app

Detection coverage for TL-2026-0614

As of 2026-05-28, Threadlinqs Intelligence publishes 9 detection rule(s) for TL-2026-0614 across Splunk SPL, Microsoft KQL and Sigma, covering 21 indicator(s) of compromise. The whole corpus is readable without an account; a free account unlocks full detection query text in Splunk SPL, Microsoft KQL and Sigma; paid tiers add raw indicator values, correlation and the MCP server. Threadlinqs MCP server · View plans.

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