US suspends Chinese company linked to Flax Typhoon hacks

The US government has sanctioned a Beijing-based cybersecurity company for collaborating with the Chinese state-backed terrorist group, known as Flax Typhoon.

Office of the Treasury Department of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Friday announced the sanctions against the Integrity Technology Group for its role in “numerous cases of computer damage to US victims,” ​​including US infrastructure.

The sanctions came months after the US government accused Integrity Technology, also known as Yongxin Zhichengrunning a botnet linked to the Flax Typhoon hacking group.

Botnet, which was was terminated by the FBI in a court-authorized operation in Septemberit was made up of more than 260,000 Internet-connected devices, including cameras, storage devices, and routers, according to a joint advisory published by the FBI and the National Security Agency at the time. The agencies said the botnet was operated and controlled by the Integrity Technology Group since 2021 to hide the activities of the Flax Typhoon hackers.

The Treasury said in a statement that Flax Typhoon used infrastructure linked to Integrity Tech to compromise several US and European organizations between 2022 and the end of 2023. The victims were not named, but the Treasury added that a Chinese-backed cybercriminal group compromised “multiple servers and sites workers in California.”

According to an article published by the US Department of State on Friday, Flax Typhoon was well aimed several US universities, government agencies, telecommunications providers, and media organizations.

The new sanctions, which identify Integrity Tech as an organization that is involved in “malicious activities that support the Internet,” come just days after the Treasury. confirmed that it was a cyberattack in December which was reported by hackers supported by the Chinese government. Hackers say it looks to the Treasury’s office of sanctions, OFACduring the intrusion, which gave the hackers away from the Treasury staff and access unclassified documents.

US officials said The Washington Post that the intrusion may have given hackers access to information about Chinese entities that the US government is considering imposing economic sanctions on.

A Treasury spokesman did not return TechCrunch’s request for comment. In a statement on Friday, Treasury called Chinese cybercriminals “one of the most serious and pressing threats” facing US national security, according to Treasury’s IT report.

Integrity Tech, which is traded on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, did not respond to TechCrunch’s inquiries.