The National Cyber Security Center – member of the IT Authority under the Ministry of Information and Communications – announced that since the beginning of 2021, Vietnam has faced numerous Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) attacks in different forms.

Most APT criminals are supported by a huge resource to carry out large-scaled attacks against economic and political organizations.

At the beginning of this April, APT Cycldek planned to launch several-month-long attack to governmental bodies in Vietnam, Thailand, and other nations in Central Asia.

APT Cycldek, also known as Goblin Panda, Cycldek, Hellsing, APT27, or 1937CN, was first detected in 2010. Its normal target is the national defence and energy organizations of a country, especially Southeast Asian ones. Its main victims are Laos and Vietnam.

Receiving warnings and monitoring information from international partners, in March 2021, NCSC paid closer attention to the cyber security status of state organizations. It has recognized that the latest APT attack is related to APT Cycldek.

Therefore, NCSC immediately cooperated with Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in the nation to stop those attempts from the end of March 2021.

Obviously, these efforts have effectively reduced the negative impacts of those APT attacks to information systems of organizations based in Vietnam.

However, NCSC still proposes that organizations and businesses actively recheck their own information systems to timely detect and stop any possible APT attack in the near future. More importantly, since APT attacks towards Vietnam become more serious and sophisticated, NCSC suggests that victims need to contact IT specialists for proper handling.

SGGP

Reference: https://vietnamnet.vn/en/sci-tech-environment/vietnam-successfully-handles-apt-attacks-727348.html