GINC-APT-0362 · State

Unfading Sea Haze

Category
State · Attributed to a state or working for one.
Origin
China(high confidence)
Motivation
Information theft and espionage
Seen
2018
Sources
6 sources carry it
Identifier
GINC-APT-0362 · unfading-sea-haze

What it is

Unfading Sea Haze is a threat actor focused on espionage, targeting government and military organizations in the South China Sea region since 2018. They employ spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments to gain initial access, followed by the deployment of custom malware such as Gh0st RAT variants and SharpJSHandler. The group utilizes scheduled tasks and manipulates local administrator accounts for persistence, while also incorporating Remote Monitoring and Management tools into their attacks. Unfading Sea Haze demonstrates a sophisticated and patient approach, remaining undetected for years and showing adaptability through evolving exfiltration tactics and malware arsenal.

Attribution

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

Targets

Sectors
Defense, Government

Tools

The tools and malware families the sources tie to it.

  • China Chopper
  • DustyExfilTool
  • EtherealGh0st
  • FluffyGh0st
  • Gh0st RAT
  • InsidiousGh0st
  • Ps2dllLoader
  • Remote Utilities
  • RemoteCMD
  • RemotePC
  • SerialPktdoor
  • SharpBot
  • SharpEye
  • SharpJSHandler
  • SharpZulip
  • SilentGh0st
  • Stubbedoor
  • TranslucentGh0st
  • gh0st
  • xkeylog

Sources