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Earth Lusca is a China-linked cyberespionage actor associated with state-sponsored hacking activity based in Chengdu. Its reported aliases include Aquatic Panda, Bronze University, Charcoal Typhoon, Chromium, ControlX, Fishmonger, RedHotel, and TAG-22. Activity tracked as Fishmonger dates to at least 2018. The actor targets government agencies, telecommunications providers, technology companies, media organizations, universities, and COVID-19 research organizations. Its operations span Asia and other regions, including documented targeting in Hong Kong, Taiwan, India, and the United States. Earth Lusca conducts vulnerability scanning of public-facing infrastructure. Activity tracked as Aquatic Panda has used public DNS logging services to identify systems vulnerable to Log4j exploitation, CVE-2021-44228, and attempted credential theft through LSASS memory dumping. Earth Lusca has used Mimikatz to exploit domain controllers through Zerologon, CVE-2020-1472, supporting lateral movement and elevated access. Its defense-evasion techniques include payload obfuscation and abuse of certutil to decode concealed payloads. The actor's toolset includes ShadowPad and Spyder for long-term monitoring, alongside FunnySwitch, BIOPASS RAT, and Cobalt Strike for initial infections. It has also deployed the multiplatform KTLVdoor backdoor in cyberespionage operations. Activity tracked as Charcoal Typhoon has used generative AI services for company and security-tool research, code debugging, script generation, and preparation of likely phishing-related material.
Mallory correlates actor tradecraft and target patterns against your stack, your sector, and your geography. See overlap before they land.
Who, where, and (when attributed) which flag flies behind the operation. Pulled from open-source reporting and Mallory's analyst review.
Sectors the actor has been observed targeting.
Geographies tied to known operations.
Attributed origin per open-source reporting.
66 distinct techniques observed across reporting, grouped by tactic. Hover any cell for the evidence excerpt; click through for MITRE's full description.
32 malware families attributed to this actor across reporting.
27 additional families tracked in Mallory.
27 CVEs this actor has used in observed campaigns. 27 of them exploited in the wild.
ESET researchers also noted indications that some attacks may involve a UEFI bootkit component, possibly exploiting CVE-2023-24932, which could allow the malware to survive a complete operating system reinstall.
Dragonfly has exploited a Windows Netlogon vulnerability (CVE-2020-1472) to obtain access to Windows Active Directory servers. Earth Lusca, FIN7, menuPass, MuddyWater, and Wizard Spider are also associated with its exploitation or attempted exploitation.
Infection sequences start with the exploitation of known security flaws in public-facing ... Microsoft Exchange Server (ProxyShell) ... servers to drop web shells and deliver Cobalt Strike for lateral movement.
Aquatic Panda has used publicly accessible DNS logging services to identify servers vulnerable to Log4j (CVE 2021-44228). Magic Hound has conducted widespread scanning to identify public-facing systems vulnerable to Log4j (CVE-2021-44228).
Details on Exploited Vulnerabilities ... CVE-2016-5195 Linux kernel 7.0
22 more CVEs tied to this actor tracked in Mallory.
116 indicators attributed to this actor: domains, IPs, hashes, and other artifacts pulled from reporting. View more in app.
20 sources tracked across advisories, community write-ups, and news. New activity surfaces here as Mallory finds it.
Listed only in technique annotations. The content does not attribute ResetNightmare exploitation or a specific campaign to this group.
Listed as an annotation to a renamed-Python-binary detection; no actor-specific campaign or behavior is described.
Used commercial AI services for reconnaissance, code debugging, script generation, and likely phishing-content development.
Earth Lusca is listed in the detection's annotations.
Match sector + geo + tech-stack targeting against your real footprint.
Every observed MITRE ATT&CK technique, grouped by tactic.
Families this actor is known to deploy, with IOCs and behavior.
CVEs this actor has used in known campaigns.
YARA, Sigma, Snort, and vendor rules, auto-deployed to your SIEM.
Domains, IPs, and hashes tied to this actor, refreshed continuously.