Security News > 2022 > September > Chinese Espionage Hackers Target Tibetans Using New LOWZERO Backdoor

A China-aligned advanced persistent threat actor known as TA413 weaponized recently disclosed flaws in Sophos Firewall and Microsoft Office to deploy a never-before-seen backdoor called LOWZERO as part of an espionage campaign aimed at Tibetan entities.

Targets primarily consisted of organizations associated with the Tibetan community, including enterprises associated with the Tibetan government-in-exile.

"This willingness to rapidly incorporate new techniques and methods of initial access contrasts with the group's continued use of well known and reported capabilities, such as the Royal Road RTF weaponizer, and often lax infrastructure procurement tendencies," Recorded Future said in a new technical analysis.

In another phishing email sent to a Tibetan target in late May, a Microsoft Word attachment hosted on the Google Firebase service attempted to leverage the Follina vulnerability to execute a PowerShell command designed to download the backdoor from a remote server.

"The group continues to incorporate new capabilities while also relying on tried-and-tested [tactics, techniques, and procedures," the cybersecurity firm said.

"TA413's adoption of both zero-day and recently published vulnerabilities is indicative of wider trends with Chinese cyber-espionage groups whereby exploits regularly appear in use by multiple distinct Chinese activity groups prior to their widespread public availability."

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https://thehackernews.com/2022/09/chinese-espionage-hackers-target.html