Chinese Hacker Added to FBI's 'Wanted List' for Anthem Breach

Written by SecureWorld News Team | Fri | May 10, 2019 | 2:45 PM Z

His name is Fujie Wang, which is 王福杰 in Chinese.

The FBI says he's a 32-year-old hacker who has been breaking into U.S. business computer networks across multiple industries.

And now the FBI has given him his own wanted poster:

Fujie Wang's wanted poster is part of a grand jury indictment in Indianapolis announced by the U.S. Justice Department.

Suspect in Anthem data breach

The indictment reveals that Wang was part of the Chinese-backed hacking group that stole 78 million records from Indianapolis-based health insurer Anthem, Inc.

The records contained things like Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, phone numbers, emails, and employment and income information.

How Wang and hacking team committed Anthem data breach

The indictment reveals the following Chinese hacking methods that worked successfully against Anthem:

Hackers sent Anthem employees targeted spear-phishing emails.
If an employee clicked on the link, it downloaded malware onto their computer.
The malware installed a backdoor so hackers had access to the computer.
Hackers used that access to move laterally across the network.
The Chinese hackers waited patiently, sometimes for months in-between moves, but continued monitoring the network.
Hackers gradually compromised user credentials with greater privileges on the network.
Chinese hackers conducted reconnaissance missions within the Anthem enterprise data warehouse, looking for valuable PII data and proprietary business data.
Hackers encrypted the data they wanted to steal and shipped it to China using the Citrix ShareFile service.
The hacking group then deleted the encrypted files it had created in hopes that would cover any digital tracks.

Wang is accused of registering and controlling domains that made this operation possible.

FBI reveals: Anthem reacted the way all organizations should

Along with the indictment, the FBI says the case was made possible by Anthem's decision to work with them:

"Anthem's cooperation and openness in working with the FBI on the investigation of this sophisticated cyber-attack was imperative in allowing for the identification of these individuals. This also speaks to the strong partnerships the FBI has with the private sector, as well as the tenacity and global reach of the Bureau," says Special Agent in Charge Grant Mendenhall.

And greater private-public partnerships around cybersecurity is a frequent topic of discussion at our regional SecureWorld conferences, fueled by our partnership with InfraGard.

Fujie Wang is believed to be living in Shenzhen, China, for now, out of reach of U.S. laws and the FBI. Read the full indictment.

However, his indictment is clearly part of a more aggressive stance toward those who hack United States organizations and government agencies.