Proofpoint recently identified a SugarGh0st RAT campaign targeting organizations in the United States involved in artificial intelligence efforts, including those in academia, private industry, and government service.
Proofpoint tracks the cluster responsible for this activity as UNK_SweetSpecter. SugarGh0st RAT is a remote access trojan, and is a customized variant of Gh0stRAT, an older commodity trojan typically used by Chinese-speaking threat actors. SugarGh0st RAT has been historically used to target users in Central and East Asia, as first reported by Cisco Talos in November 2023.
Read more…
Source: ProofPoint
Related:
- New details on commercial spyware vendor Variston
November 30, 2022
Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, using our research to improve the safety and security of Google’s products and share intelligence with our industry peers. TAG’s research underscores that the commercial surveillance industry is thriving and has expanded significantly in recent years, creating risk for Internet ...
- Always Another Secret: Lifting the Haze on China-nexus Espionage in Southeast Asia
November 28, 2022
Mandiant Managed Defense recently identified cyber espionage activity that heavily leverages USB devices as an initial infection vector and concentrates on the Philippines. Mandiant tracks this activity as UNC4191 and we assess it has a China nexus. UNC4191 operations have affected a range of public and private sector entities primarily in Southeast Asia and extending to ...
- US bans Huawei, ZTE equipment sales amid Chinese spying fears
November 27, 2022
The Biden administration has banned approvals of new telecommunications equipment from China’s Huawei Technologies and ZTE because they pose “an unacceptable risk” to US national security. The US Federal Communications Commission said on Friday it had adopted the final rules, which also bar the sale or import of equipment made by China’s surveillance equipment maker Dahua ...
- RCMP use of spyware warrants update to Canada’s privacy laws, MPs say
November 24, 2022
Canada should update its privacy laws in the wake of revelations that the country’s national police force uses spyware to hack mobile devices, a parliamentary committee says. The House of Commons ethics committee is recommending the federal government require privacy assessments for the use of “high-risk technological tools” that collect personal data, according to a report ...
- Earth Preta Spear-Phishing Governments Worldwide
November 17, 2022
Trend Micro researchers have been monitoring a wave of spear-phishing attacks targeting the government, academic, foundations, and research sectors around the world. Based on the lure documents researchers observed in the wild, this is a large-scale cyberespionage campaign that began around March. After months of tracking, the seemingly wide outbreak of targeted attacks includes but ...
- Billbug: State-sponsored Actor Targets Cert Authority, Government Agencies in Multiple Asian Countries
November 15, 2022
State-sponsored actors compromised a digital certificate authority in an Asian country during a campaign in which multiple government agencies were also targeted. Symantec, by Broadcom Software, was able to link this activity to a group we track as Billbug due to the use in this campaign of tools previously attributed to this group. Billbug (aka Lotus ...