The Department of Justice on Wednesday said that twelve Chinese citizens, including two public security ministry officials, have been motivated for a series of hacking attacks, including a violation of 2024.
Other alleged victims include US-based Chinese dissatisfied, foreign ministry of many Asian countries, religious organizations and additional American and state government agencies.
Anxun Information Technology Co. Eight employees of a Chinese company called LTD are also known as I-SOON, and the Ministry of two public safety officers was motivated to join the alleged hacking of email accounts, cell phones, servers and websites between 2016 and 2023 in New York.
“For years, these 10 defendants – two of which we alleged (People’s Republic of China – PRC) officials – used refined hacking techniques to target religious organizations, journalists and government agencies, to collect sensitive information for the use of all PRCs,” US Attorney Mathew Podolski said in a statement.
The Department of Justice said that private Chinese hackers were paid in some cases by the Chinese Ministries of Public Safety and State Security to take advantage of special victims.
“In many other cases, hackers targeted the victims in betting,” it said, identifying weak computers and then selling information hacked to the Chinese government.
The Department of Justice said that I-Soun charged public and state security ministries between $ 10,000 and $ 75,000 for each email inbox.
All 10 defendants remain largely and the State Department gave a reward of up to $ 10 million for information for their arrest.
Hacking targets allegedly included a missionary organization, a group, focused on promoting human rights and religious freedom in China, a Hong Kong newspaper and foreign ministries of Taiwan, India, South Korea and Indonesia.
– ‘Silk Typhoon’ –
In Washington, a separate prosecution against Yin Kcheng and Zhou Shui was also unheard, “Apt 27,”, the alleged member of the hacker group is also known as “silk typhoon”.
The Department of Justice said, “Yin, Zhou, and their co-ancients took advantage of the weaknesses in the afflicted network, operated the reconnaissing once inside those networks, and installed malware such as plugX malware, which provides frequent access,” said the Department of Justice.
His goals included US-based technology companies, think tanks, law firms, defense contractors, local governments, health care systems and universities.
In January, the United States approved Yin for alleged involvement in a hack by the Treasury Department last year.
According to American media outlets, the then-Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and other senior Treasury officers were among the target people.
The State Department announced a reward of each $ 2 million for information for the arrest of Yin and Jhou, which is believed to be in China.
Many countries, especially the United States, which they say, have given an alarm voice on the Chinese-government-supported hacking activity targeting their governments, terrorists and businesses.
Beijing dismissed the allegations, and earlier stated that it protests and cracks on cyber attack.
(Except for the headline, the story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is published by a syndicated feed.)
