China's Cyber Blitz: APT Mojo, Zero-Day Woes, and Hacker Hydro-Hype

This is your China Hack Report: Daily US Tech Defense podcast.

Hey listeners, I’m Ting, your go-to for China cyber sleuthing with a dash of nerdy fun, and today—September 21, 2025—let’s rip through the pulse of US tech defense as the China Hack Report is hotter than ever.

Just in the last 24 hours, things got loud. First up, the spotlight’s on the crew known as TA415. According to HackerNews and Proofpoint, for months but especially this week, these folks escalated their mojo, launching fresh spearphishing attacks on US government agencies, think tanks, and academics—always those deep in US-China trade and policy. Their latest move uses economic relations-themed emails, sometimes masquerading as the Chair of the Select Committee on Strategic Competition or the US-China Business Council. Why that matters: the lures land in the inboxes of people setting America’s China policy, which is not just drama—it’s operational risk.

Simultaneously, X-Force and IBM’s research shows the infamous Hive0154—aka Mustang Panda—just dropped a brand new variant of their Toneshell backdoor and unleashed the novel SnakeDisk USB worm. It’s built to evade antivirus tools right now, and its main trick is blending C2 traffic through local proxies, looking normal to busy IT teams. The SnakeDisk worm is especially quirky: it only activates in Thailand based on IP, but its tech is portable, meaning if US devices get targeted, expect similar threats. Oh, and SnakeDisk drops the Yokai backdoor, which means attackers can remotely command infected devices. Basically, Mustang Panda’s tooling up for global mischief—including against US-aligned organizations.

Meanwhile, Security Affairs reports APT41—China’s legendary APT group—pivoted again, targeting US government agencies, think tanks, and academics with links to China policy, confirming that activity isn’t isolated, it’s campaign-based and persistent, so defenders, stay caffeinated.

Now for new malware: If you’re dealing with Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile, double-check everything. CISA just released an urgent warning after malware strains were found exploiting two newly revealed vulnerabilities, tracked as CVE-2025-4427 and CVE-2025-4428. The malware comes in two sets: each drops malicious loaders granting cyber thugs the ability to execute arbitrary code on compromised servers. US authorities say patch immediately—this is not “patch this weekend when you get around to it,” it’s “patch before finishing this episode.” If you’re running SonicWall, SonicWall urges all customers to reset credentials after cloud firewall settings were possibly exposed—under 5% affected, but don’t be that 5%. Emergency patches and resets must happen now.

If water makes your world go round, OPB and multiple sources remind us that Chinese hackers—especially Volt Typhoon—are burrowing into US water systems and critical infrastructure not for a quick payday, but to set up assets in case of future geopolitical tension, like a Taiwan crisis. The message from the EPA and Dragos: defend, segment, and harden industrial controls, because these attacks are about more than ones and zeroes—they’re about clean water and national resilience.

CISA’s defensive guidance for today: patch Ivanti and Chrome zero-days, double-check password/reset protocols if using SonicWall, and aggressively monitor system logs for odd lateral movement or new user account creation—all classic post-exploit hallmarks.

Listeners, this 24-hour blitz underscores one thing: the US-China cyber rivalry isn’t just policy, it’s lived reality—across malware, phishing, infrastructure, and day-to-day IT drama. Thanks for tuning in to today’s snappy rundown; don’t forget to subscribe for your daily cyber caffeine fix. This has been a quiet please production, for more check out quiet please dot ai.

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