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Security researchers have found a new memory-scraping malware program that steals payment card data from point-of-sale (PoS) terminals and sends it back to attackers using the Domain Name System (DNS).

Dubbed Multigrain, the threat is part of a family of malware programs known as NewPosThings, with which it shares some code. However, this variant was designed to target specific environments.

That's because unlike other PoS malware programs that look for card data in the memory of many processes, Multigrain targets a single process called multi.exe that's associated with a popular back-end card authorization and PoS server. If this process is not running on the compromised machine, the infection routine exists and the malware deletes itself.

"This shows that while developing or building their malware, the attackers had a very specific knowledge of the target environment and knew this process would be running," security researchers from FireEye said in a blog post.

FireEye did not name the PoS software that Multigrain targeted. However, threats like this show the need for companies to monitor the DNS traffic that originates from their own networks for suspicious behavior.