US Sanctions Chinese Government Contractor Employing Flax Typhoon Hackers

The United States imposed sanctions on Beijing-based cybersecurity company Integrity Technology Group, which is a People’s Republic of China (PRC) government contractor, saying the company was involved in malicious botnet operations targeting U.S. victims.

PRC-based hackers known as Flax Typhoon were working for Integrity Tech when they targeted critical infrastructure in the U.S. and overseas, the U.S. Department of State said in a Friday (Jan. 3) press release.

The company was the focus of an operation announced in September by the U.S. Department of Justice, which disrupted a botnet that was created by Integrity Tech and infected more than 200,000 consumer devices in the U.S. and worldwide, according to the release.

“These multi-agency efforts reflect our whole-of-government approach to protecting and defending against PRC cyber threats to Americans, our critical systems, and those of our allies and partners,” the State Department said in its Friday press release. “The United States will continue to use all the tools at its disposal to safeguard U.S. critical infrastructure and the American people from irresponsible and reckless cyber actors.”

When the DOJ announced the law enforcement operation targeted Flax Typhoon hackers working for Integrity Tech on Sept. 18, it said the botnet was controlled by Integrity Tech and was used to conduct malicious cyber activity.

A joint cybersecurity advisory issued on the same day said that Integrity Tech aimed to use the botnet to conceal its identity while deploying distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks or compromising U.S. networks.

It was reported in December that President-elect Donald Trump is looking for ways to get tougher on cyberattackers.

U.S. Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida, who is Trump’s choice to serve as national security adviser, told CBS’ Face the Nation Dec. 15 that the government needs to stop focusing so much on shoring up its cyber defense measures and go on the offense.

“We need to start going on the offense and start imposing, I think, higher costs and consequences to private actors and nation-state actors that continue to steal our data, that continue to spy on us,” Waltz said.

Waltz added that hackers are “literally putting cyber time bombs on our infrastructure, our water systems, our grids, even our ports.”