By South China Morning Post | Created at 2025-03-05 17:21:22 | Updated at 2025-03-06 03:25:14
10 hours ago
Beijing is orchestrating a “hacker-for-hire” ecosystem – involving contract hackers, Chinese tech company employees and government officials – to carry out cyberattacks aimed at stealing data from organizations worldwide, according to a senior US national security official.
In a major effort to combat these cyber activities, the US Department of Justice announced the indictment on Wednesday of 12 Chinese nationals have been indicted, including two officials from China’s Ministry of Public Security, employees from the private Chinese firm Anxun Information Technology Co Ltd – also known as i-Soon, and members of APT27, an alleged Beijing-backed hacking group.
The individuals face federal charges in New York and Washington.
Senior national security officials said the network had targeted several entities, including the US Treasury Department, which endured a significant breach in 2024.
“The indictments and other court documents allege that Chinese law enforcement and intelligence services exploit China’s reckless and indiscriminate hacker-for-hire ecosystem to suppress free speech and steal data from numerous organizations around the world, including the Treasury Department,” the official said.
The US State Department also announced sanctions on Zhou Shuai, a “Shanghai-based malicious cyber actor and data broker”, along with his company, Shanghai Heiying Information Technology Co.
