APT41 successfully infiltrated and maintained prolonged, unauthorised access to numerous victims' networks over the last year.
Technology, logistics, shipping, and automotive organisations across Asia and Europe have been subjected to malware attacks by Chinese state-sponsored threat operation APT41.
According to research from Google’s Mandiant team, targets in the UK, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Italy, Spain have been subjected to malware attacks by Chinese state-sponsored threat operation APT41 since last year.
Researchers said APT41 successfully infiltrated and maintained prolonged, unauthorised access to numerous victims' networks since 2023, enabling them to extract sensitive data over an extended period.
The attackers deploy a combination of the ANTSWORD and BLUEBEAM web shells for persistence, and the DUSTTRAP dropper which decrypts a malicious payload and executes it in memory, leaving minimal forensic traces.
"The decrypted payload was designed to establish communication channels with either APT41-controlled infrastructure for command and control or, in some instances, with a compromised Google Workspace account, further blending its malicious activities with legitimate traffic," said researchers.
Written by
Dan Raywood
Senior Editor
SC Media UK
Dan Raywood is a B2B journalist with more than 20 years of experience, including covering cybersecurity for the past 16 years. He has extensively covered topics from Advanced Persistent Threats and nation-state hackers to major data breaches and regulatory changes.
He has spoken at events including 44CON, Infosecurity Europe, RANT Conference, BSides Scotland, Steelcon and ESET Security Days.
Outside work, Dan enjoys supporting Tottenham Hotspur, managing mischievous cats, and sampling craft beers.
