The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Wednesday announced 12 Chinese nationals have been indicted in a global “hackers-for-hire” scheme to “inflict digital harm on Americans who criticize the Chinese Communist Party.”
Court documents unsealed on Wednesday accused China’s Ministry of Public Security (MPS) and Ministry of State Security (MSS) of directing and financing the hackers to “conduct computer intrusions against high-value targets in the United States and elsewhere.”
“Victims include U.S.-based critics and dissidents of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), a large religious organization in the United States, the foreign ministries of multiple governments in Asia, and U.S. federal and state government agencies, including most recently in 2024,” DOJ said.
“By employing these hackers-for-hire, the PRC government further allowed these same hackers to profit by committing additional computer intrusions around the world with impunity, and then to sell stolen data through Chinese data brokers,” DOJ added.
The first two Chinese nationals indicted in the case, Yin “YKC” Kecheng and Zhou “Coldface” Shuai, were allegedly linked to a state-sponsored Chinese hacking group known as APT27, “LuckyMouse,” or “Emissary Panda.”
The group has been active since 2010, with an early emphasis on cyber-espionage attacks against corporate and government systems in the Western world, the Middle East, and Taiwan. APT27’s later exploits included profitable cyber-crimes.
DOJ charged Yin and Zhou with “sophisticated computer hacking conspiracies that successfully targeted a wide variety of US.-based victims from 2011 to the present day,” inflicting “millions of dollars worth of damages.” Both Yin and Zhou have previously been named in multiple-count indictments for fraud, identity theft, and money laundering.
A second announcement from DOJ on Wednesday added indictments for two MPS officers and eight employees of an “ostensibly private” company called Anxun Information Technology Col. Ltd., also known as i-Soon.
Hellbound and Down 