Honeypot Threat Analysis — September 20, 2026
Critical threat level — massive coordinated attack activity across all honeypot services.
2026-09-20 - Cybersecurity Analysis
Threat Overview
In the week of September 20th, 2026, our honeypot system at honey-ai.dev experienced a significant number of security incidents. The data gathered indicates that 8223 critical alerts were generated by Suricata IDS on behalf of over 700 IPs, resulting in a total of 252 attackers engaging with our honeypot.
Geographic Analysis
The geographical distribution of the top IP addresses is as follows:
- United States: 445 (33%)
- Germany: 165 (12%)
- Belgium: 79 (5%)
- Netherlands: 76 (5%)
- China: 65 (4%)
- United Kingdom: 60 (4%)
- Pakistan: 56 (4%)
- Hong Kong: 33 (2%)
- Korea, Republic of: 32 (2%)
These regions highlight the global nature of cyber threats and underscore the importance of multi-regional security measures.
SSH Brute Force
SSH brute force attacks were a significant threat on this day. The system recorded over 151 commands executed by attackers against multiple IPs. This indicates that even after implementing strong access controls, users are still engaging in poor password practices or misconfigurations.
The top passwords used were:
91566946b1d8deb0aad3f9ba1d6740cc8d969eef6ecad3c2e996bb0ea465fae7root
Web Scanning
The day saw a considerable number of HTTP requests, with 33 IPs making 104 requests. The most common paths accessed were:
/(Home Page)/setup.cgi/data/statussupport_diagnostic_ping.cgi/data/statussupport_diagnostic_ping
IDS & Scan Intel
The Suricata IDS detected and logged over 8223 alerts, indicating a high level of activity. This is particularly concerning given the critical nature of many of these alerts.
Malware
There were no malware captures reported on this day.
Tarpit
While attempting to trap connections from 160 IPs totaling 700 unique addresses, the tarpitting operation resulted in only a small number of sessions being blocked. This underscores the effectiveness of some security measures but highlights a need for further improvements in connection management and resource allocation.
Canarytokens
The day saw the detection of three triggers for canary tokens, indicating successful attempts to authenticate through AWS token mechanisms:
- AWS Token from 91.200.214.139 - user-agent: Go-http-client/1.1
- AWS Token from 91.200.212.202 - user-agent: Go-http-client/1.1
- AWS Token from 152.53.236.20 - user-agent: Python-urllib/3.12
MCP Trap
The system detected seven requests related to the Malicious Network Protocol (MCP) trap, with no open ports being exploited.
Portscans
No port scans were initiated or opened during this period.
AI Defense
Our AI defense measures successfully blocked 25 leaks and 0 injections on that day. The effectiveness of these tools suggests a good combination of machine learning and traditional security practices.
Community Defense
The honeypot system continued to monitor for community-based threats, but no significant new information was detected during this period.
Conclusion
Despite the number of alerts logged, our honeypot remains a valuable tool in detecting and analyzing cyber threats. The high volume of SSH brute force attempts highlights the need for improved password management policies and user education on secure practices. The low tarpit rate suggests that connection management strategies are effective but warrant further optimization to handle increased traffic.
The detection of canary tokens points to successful attempts at authenticated attacks, which emphasizes the importance of robust authentication mechanisms. While no malware was detected or exploits were initiated, the data indicates ongoing efforts by attackers seeking to exploit vulnerabilities in our honeypot environment.
Overall, while there is a significant threat landscape present on this day, the system remains capable of detecting and analyzing these threats effectively. Continuous monitoring and improvement of security practices are crucial for maintaining an effective defense against evolving cyber threats.
This analysis was generated by qwen2.5:1.5b running locally on the Raspberry Pi 5 honeypot lab. All data comes from real attacks captured in the last 24 hours by HoneyAI. View the raw data report for complete metrics.