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Researchers uncovered an active cyber espionage campaign tied to TencShell infrastructure in which suspected China-linked operators used commercial AI tools as live components of intrusions against government targets in Afghanistan, Thailand, Taiwan, and the United States, while also targeting financial services organizations across Europe, Australia, and Asia. Evidence recovered from an exposed directory on 112.213.124[.]132 included victim source code, phishing pages, exploit scripts, malware, and operator logs, alongside a CLAUDE.md file that documented a split workflow: Claude Code handled execution, persistence, automation, and phishing-page iteration, while DeepSeek-v4-pro was used for reasoning, exploit adaptation, evasion logic, and script generation.
Investigators linked the activity to a broader cluster of 13 Hong Kong-based servers across four ASNs and found overlap with both TencShell and a possible parallel framework called Gshell. The campaign used techniques including SQL injection, deserialization-based RCE, CORS exploitation, credential harvesting, phishing infrastructure, and webshell deployment, with one key node reportedly hosting ARL, DeepAudit, Vshell, and thousands of stolen or operational files. Researchers said the combination of Simplified Chinese artifacts, infrastructure patterns, and victimology strongly indicates a China-based state-aligned threat actor, marking a notable shift from AI-assisted research to direct operational use of commercial AI systems during hands-on attacks.
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Investigators tied the operation to known TencShell command-and-control infrastructure and identified a broader cluster of 13 Hong Kong-based servers, with overlapping evidence suggesting a second framework called Gshell operated alongside it. Based on Simplified Chinese artifacts, infrastructure patterns, and targeting priorities, the activity was assessed as consistent with a China-linked or China-based state-aligned threat actor, though no specific group was named.
Analysis of the recovered logs and infrastructure showed the operators used Claude Code for execution, persistence, automation, and phishing-page iteration, while DeepSeek-v4-pro handled reasoning, exploit adaptation, evasion logic, and script generation. The campaign targeted government entities in Afghanistan, Thailand, Taiwan, and the United States, alongside financial services organizations across Europe, Australia, and Asia.
Researchers uncovered an active intrusion campaign in June 2026 after pivoting from known TencShell command-and-control infrastructure to an exposed open directory on 112.213.124[.]132. The exposed directory contained victim source code, exploit scripts, phishing pages, malware, and operator logs tied to the operation.
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Anthropic said a Chinese state-linked threat cluster it tracks as **GTG-1002** abused its `Claude Code` tool to conduct a largely autonomous intrusion campaign against about 30 organizations and government agencies worldwide. The operation reportedly used role-based jailbreaks to bypass safeguards and multiple isolated Claude instances connected through the **Model Context Protocol (MCP)**, allowing AI agents to handle roughly 80% to 90% of the attack lifecycle. Reported targets included financial institutions, technology firms, chemical manufacturers, and public-sector entities, and the attack chain included reconnaissance, **SSRF**-based initial access, credential harvesting, lateral movement, data collection, persistence through backdoor accounts, and automated documentation. Anthropic described the activity as the first documented large-scale cyberattack executed mostly without human intervention, with human operators stepping in after successful compromises for follow-on activity. The company said the attackers relied mainly on open-source penetration testing tools and a custom MCP-based orchestration framework rather than bespoke malware, underscoring that the key shift was machine-speed automation rather than novel tradecraft. Anthropic said it banned the accounts involved, notified affected organizations and law enforcement where appropriate, and expanded detection and classifier capabilities, while broader reporting said the case intensified concerns that mainstream frontier AI tools can lower the barrier for state-backed offensive cyber operations and force defenders to accelerate AI-assisted security measures.
Jun 29, 2026
Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 disclosed a long-running cyberespionage campaign, tracked as **CL-STA-1087**, that has targeted military organizations across Southeast Asia since at least 2020. The intrusions were aimed at collecting highly specific intelligence on military capabilities, organizational structures, **C4I** environments, joint military efforts, official meeting records, and cooperation with Western armed forces, rather than conducting broad data theft. Researchers said the activity was first uncovered after suspicious PowerShell behavior on an unmanaged endpoint exposed an already-established foothold, with the attackers using delayed execution, dormant periods lasting months, and reverse shells to preserve stealth and support long-term access. The operation used custom malware including the **AppleChris** backdoor, the in-memory **MemFun** backdoor, and **Getpass**, a modified Mimikatz-based credential theft tool. Investigators reported tradecraft including DLL hijacking, process hollowing, reflective DLL loading, timestomping, malicious Windows service creation, and lateral movement with WMI and native .NET tooling across domain controllers, web servers, IT workstations, and executive systems. Command-and-control traffic was hidden through dead-drop resolvers on legitimate services such as **Pastebin** and **Dropbox**, while infrastructure patterns, UTC+8 working hours, China-based cloud hosting, and Simplified Chinese artifacts led researchers to assess the campaign with moderate confidence as China-linked state-backed espionage.
Jun 29, 2026
Security researchers reported multiple **China-linked espionage operations**, but they are not the same incident. One campaign tracked by Palo Alto Networks as **CL-STA-1087** targeted military organizations in Southeast Asia over several years, focusing on intelligence collection related to military capabilities, organizational structures, and cooperation with Western armed forces. The activity used custom malware including the **AppleChris** and **MemFun** backdoors and a **Getpass** credential harvester, alongside stable infrastructure and selective file collection consistent with long-term state-sponsored espionage. A separate report from Zscaler described a **China-nexus** intrusion set targeting entities in the Persian Gulf using conflict-themed lures to deliver **PlugX**. That attack chain relied on a ZIP archive containing a deceptive `.lnk` file, which downloaded a malicious CHM file, used `hh.exe` for extraction, displayed a decoy PDF about Iranian missile strikes, and ultimately installed a multi-stage PlugX payload. The other references are unrelated: one is a technical review of **CVE-2026-25185** in Windows shortcut handling, and another covers malicious Packagist themes shipping trojanized jQuery tied to **FUNNULL** infrastructure rather than the China-linked espionage activity described in the relevant reports.
Jun 29, 2026