Chinese hackers have launched a wave of cyberattacks on mainly US engineering and defense companies linked to the disputed South China Sea, cybersecurity firm FireEye said.
A suspected Chinese cyberespionage group dubbed TEMP.Periscope appears to be seeking information that would benefit the Chinese government, the US-based provider of network protection systems said.
The hackers have focused on US maritime entities that were either linked to — or have clients operating in — the South China Sea, FireEye senior analyst Fred Plan said in Los Angeles.
“They are going after data that can be used strategically, so it is line with state espionage,” said Plan, whose firm has tracked the group since 2013. “A private entity probably wouldn’t benefit from the sort of data that is being stolen.”
The TEMP.Periscope hackers have been seeking information in areas such as radar range or how precisely a system in development could detect activity at sea, Plan said.
The surge in attacks picked up pace last month and is ongoing, he added.
While FireEye traced the group’s attacks to China, the firm has not confirmed any link to Chinese government entities or facilities.
FireEye declined to name any targets.
Although most were based in the US, organizations in Europe and at least one in Hong Kong were also affected, the firm said.
Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang (陸慷) yesterday told a briefing in Beijing that China opposed all kinds of cyberattacks.
“We will continue to implement the important consensus on cybersecurity reached in 2015,” he said.
The number of suspected Chinese cyberattacks on US targets has picked up over the past few months, after both sides agreed not to attack civilian entities, Plan said.
The 2015 deal to tamp down economic espionage was hammered out by then-US president Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平).
The US indicted five Chinese military officials in 2014 on charges that they stole trade secrets from companies after hacks were detected by Mandiant, a unit of FireEye.
China has denied the charges and has said that it is a victim, rather than an instigator of cybersecurity attacks.
Data sought in the latest incidents could be used, for instance, to determine how closely a vessel could sail to a geographical feature, Plan said.
“It is definitely the case that they can use this information for strategic decisionmaking,” he said.
The US Navy sometimes conducts so-called freedom of navigation operations to challenge Chinese claims to more than 80 percent of the South China Sea — one of the world’s busiest trading routes.
Taiwan, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines also claim all or parts of the waters.
China has reclaimed about 1,290 hectares of land in the waters and has built ports, runways and other military infrastructure on seven artificial features it has created.
The attacks were carried out using a variety of techniques, including “spear-phishing,” in which e-mails with links and attachments containing malware are used to open back doors into computer networks.
In some cases, the e-mails were made to look as if they originated from a “big international maritime company,” Plan said.
FireEye said in a separate report that government offices, media and academic institutions have been attacked, along with engineering and defense companies.
Plan declined to comment when asked whether the US Navy was among the targets.
“Given the type of organizations that have been targeted — the organizations and government offices — it is most likely the case that TEMP.Periscope is operating on behalf of a [Chinese] government office,” Plan said.
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