GINC-APT-0004 · State

APT28

Also Forest Blizzard, Sofacy, STRONTIUM, UAC-0063, APT 28, APT-C-20 and 48 other names.

Category
State · Attributed to a state or working for one.
Origin
Russia(high confidence)
Sponsor
State-sponsored, two GRU units known as Unit 26165 and Unit 74455
Agency named
GRU, GTsSS, NSA, Unit 26165, Unit 74455
Motivation
Espionage; Information theft and espionage
Seen
2004–2026
Status
Active
ATT&CK
G0007 · 93 techniques
Sources
15 sources carry it
Identifier
GINC-APT-0004 · apt28

What it is

APT28 is a threat group that has been attributed to Russia's General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) 85th Main Special Service Center (GTsSS) military unit 26165. This group has been active since at least 2004.

APT28 reportedly compromised the Hillary Clinton campaign, the Democratic National Committee, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2016 in an attempt to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. In 2018, the US indicted five GRU Unit 26165 officers associated with APT28 for cyber operations (including close-access operations) conducted between 2014 and 2018 against the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the US Anti-Doping Agency, a US nuclear facility, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the Spiez Swiss Chemicals Laboratory, and other organizations. Some of these were conducted with the assistance of GRU Unit 74455, which is also referred to as Sandworm Team.

Names

The names each vendor, agency and source gives it. Naming differs by who tracks the actor, so one group carries many.

CERT-UA
UAC-0063, UAC-0001, UAC-0028
CrowdStrike
Fancy Bear
IBM X-Force
ITG05
Mandiant
APT 28
Microsoft
Forest Blizzard
MITRE ATT&CK
G0007
NSA leak
SIG40
Proofpoint
TA422
PwC
Blue Athena
Qihoo 360
APT-C-20
Recorded Future
TAG-0700, TAG-110
Secureworks
IRON TWILIGHT, TG-4127, Threat Group-4127
Talos and others
Group 74
Thales
ATK5
Operations
Operation Pawn Storm, Operation “DealersChoice”, Operation “Dear Joohn”, Operation “Komplex”, Operation “Pawn Storm”, Operation “RoundPress”, Operation “Russian Doll”, Operation “Steal-It”
Other names
Sofacy, STRONTIUM, Armada Collective, ATG2, ATK 5, BlueDelta, CrisisFour, Dark Power, Fighting Ursa, FROZENLAKE, Grey-Cloud, Grizzly Steppe, Group-4127, GruesomeLarch, HELLFIRE, LAKE RELIC, Pawn Storm, PawnStorm, Sednit, SNAKEMACKEREL, Sofacy Group, Sofacy, APT 28, Fancy Bear, Sednit, Swallowtail, T-APT-12, Tsar Team, TsarTeam, Z-Lom Team

Attribution

Each attribution is a claim: who makes it, and to whom. Western and Eastern sources are kept apart, as they often disagree.

Chinese and Russian sources

Targets

Countries
Afghanistan, Armenia, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, Australia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, China, Croatia, Cyprus, European Commission, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, India, International Association of Athletics Federations, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Montenegro, NATO, Netherlands, Norway, OSCE, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Thailand, Türkiye, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uzbekistan, World Anti-Doping Agency
Sectors
Automotive, Aviation, Chemical, Construction, Defense, Education, Embassies, Energy, Engineering, Financial, Government, Government, Administration, Healthcare, Industrial, IT, Media, Military, NGOs, Oil and gas, Security Service, Think Tanks

Tools

The first 60 of 78 tools and malware families the sources tie to it.

  • ADVSTORESHELL
  • ArguePatch
  • BEARDSHELL
  • Backdoor.Oldrea
  • BadPaw
  • CHOPSTICK
  • CORESHELL
  • CaddyWiper
  • Cannon
  • Cherry Picker
  • Computrace
  • Coreshell
  • CredoMap
  • Cyber Eye RAT
  • CyberGate
  • DealersChoice
  • DownRange
  • Downdelph
  • DriveOcean
  • Drovorub
  • Foozer
  • Forfiles
  • FusionDrive
  • Fysbis
  • GONEPOSTAL
  • GooseEgg
  • Graphite
  • HIDEDRV
  • HTTP WEB BACKDOOR
  • HideDrv (Rootkit)
  • JHUHUGIT
  • Koadic
  • Komplex
  • LAMEHUG
  • LoJax
  • MASEPIE
  • Mimikatz
  • Mocky LNK
  • Net
  • OCEANMAP
  • OLDBAIT
  • PixyNetLoader
  • PocoDown
  • Promptflux
  • Promptsteal
  • Responder
  • SLIMAGENT
  • SOURFACE
  • STEELHOOK
  • Sedkit
  • Sednit
  • Sedreco
  • Sedreco Dropper
  • SeduUploader
  • Seduploader
  • Sofacy
  • SpyPress
  • Tor
  • USBStealer
  • Unidentified 078 (Zebrocy Nim Loader?)

Sources