- Category
- State · Attributed to a state or working for one.
- Origin
- China(high confidence)
- Sponsor
- State-sponsored, Shenyang Military Region Technical Reconnaissance Bureau, possibly Unit 65017
- Motivation
- Information theft and espionage
- Seen
- 2009–2026
- Status
- Active
- ATT&CK
- G0131 · 15 techniques
- Sources
- 13 sources carry it
- Identifier
- GINC-APT-0021 · tonto-team
ChinaWhat it is
Tonto Team is a suspected Chinese state-sponsored cyber espionage threat group that has primarily targeted South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the United States since at least 2009; by 2020 they expanded operations to include other Asian as well as Eastern European countries. Tonto Team has targeted government, military, energy, mining, financial, education, healthcare, and technology organizations, including through the Heartbeat Campaign (2009-2012) and Operation Bitter Biscuit (2017).
Names
The names each vendor, agency and source gives it. Naming differs by who tracks the actor, so one group carries many.
- CrowdStrike
- Karma Panda, Tonto Team, HartBeat, Karma Panda
- Government agency
- PLA Unit 65017
- Microsoft
- Copper Typhoon
- MITRE ATT&CK
- G0131
- PwC
- Red Beifang
- Recorded Future
- TAG-74
- Secureworks
- BRONZE HUNTLEY
- Trend Micro
- Earth Akhlut
- Operations
- Operation “Bitter Biscuit”
- Other names
- Bisonal (malware), CactusPete, COPPER, HartBeat, HeartBeat, LONE CASTLE, Lone Ranger, LoneRanger, Sharp-R
Attribution
Each attribution is a claim: who makes it, and to whom. Western and Eastern sources are kept apart, as they often disagree.
Western sources
- ETDA / ThaiCERTChina
- MISP Galaxy (CFR tagging)China
- MicrosoftChina
- ThreatActor.info (Malpedia et al.)China · high
Targets
- Countries
- Eastern Europe, India, Japan, Mongolia, Russia, South Korea, Taiwan, United States
- Sectors
- Defense, Financial, Government, IT, Media, Military, Private sector
Tools
The tools and malware families the sources tie to it.
- 8.t Dropper
- Bioazih
- Bisonal
- Dexbia
- DoubleT
- Flapjack
- LaZagne
- Living off the Land
- Mimikatz
- NBTscan
- RoyalRoad RTF Weaponizer
- ShadowPad
- ShadowPad Winnti
- gsecdump
Sources
- MITRE ATT&CK attack.mitre.org
- ETDA Threat Group Card apt.etda.or.th
- Malpedia malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de