Chinese cyber espionage group targeting Indian firms: FireEye

Cyber security firm FireEye today said a China-based cyber espionage group, APT10, targeted manufacturing companies and IT service providers in India since last year.

"FireEye has detected APT10 activity across six continents in 2016 and 2017. APT10 has targeted or compromised manufacturing companies in India, Japan and Northern Europe; a mining company in South America; and multiple IT service providers worldwide," it said in a statement.

APT10 is a Chinese cyber espionage group that FireEye has tracked since 2009.

"They have historically targeted construction and engineering, aerospace, and telecom firms, and governments in the US, Europe, and Japan," Fireeye said.

The company said the recent APT10 activity included both traditional spear phishing and access to victim's networks through service providers.

"Service providers have significant access to customer networks, enabling an attacker who had compromised a service provider to move laterally into the network of the service provider's customer," it said.

"IT services have been a core engine of India's economic growth, with service providers here scaling the value chain to manage business-critical functions of top global organisations," FireEye Managing Director India Kaushal Dalal said.

He added that campaigns like this highlight risks which all organisations should factor into their operations.