Most infostealer infections happen on unmanaged or personal devices — outside the visibility of antivirus, EDR, or SIEM. Once credentials and session tokens are stolen, they’re quietly uploaded to criminal marketplaces and Telegram channels.

Stolen infostealer logs give attackers everything they need to impersonate real users — without logging in, triggering MFA, or raising alerts. These access methods vary in technique, but all exploit existing trust.

Infostealers follow a short, automated process designed to go unnoticed by both users and security software. The entire attack usually takes less than 30 seconds.

Infostealers are designed to evade traditional tools — and they succeed. That’s why prevention must focus on limiting access, visibility, and exposure in the first place.

Several credential stealer families are actively used in 2025, each with slightly different focus areas, delivery methods, and payloads. Many are sold as malware-as-a-service (MaaS), meaning they can be easily purchased and deployed by attackers without technical skill.

Infostealer infections rarely trigger alarms. Early detection depends not on spotting the malware itself, but on recognizing subtle signs of its aftermath. They happen fast, leave few traces, and often occur on devices outside of your visibility. But they do leave behind signals — if you know what to look for.

Infostealers are designed to extract any data that provides access to systems, services, or user identities. What they steal depends on the variant, but most target:

If you suspect an infostealer is active in your environment, immediate response is critical. These infections often go undetected by traditional tools — while silently leaking credentials, session tokens, and business data. Attackers can act within minutes.

Infostealers infect indiscriminately — but some organizations are far more likely to be affected than others. This has less to do with industry and more with how access is managed and where weak points exist.

Infostealers are purpose-built to remain undetected for as long as possible. The longer a victim is unaware of the infection, the longer the stolen credentials remain valuable. Once a breach is discovered, passwords are reset, tokens are revoked, and access is lost.

Infostealers are dangerous because they often go unnoticed — triggering no alerts, no crashes, and few visible symptoms — while exposing full access to attackers.