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Chinese state hackers ran agents on a DeepSeek model against more than 200 organizations, CrowdStrike says
CrowdStrike says a China-linked group it calls VAPOR PANDA has run an framework, ARTEX, against "more than 200 distinct organizations" since October 17th. A main agent directs planner and worker agents, and a human operator steps in at decision points. The framework used "a Chinese-developed DeepSeek ," with no version named, plus a second commercial model CrowdStrike did not identify.
CrowdStrike confirmed intrusions at nine organizations and found telecoms compromised in the US, Belgium and the Philippines, across at least 14 countries. Targets included foreign and interior ministries, defense, semiconductor and nuclear organizations. One logged operator instruction told the agent to find Windows machines "without Falcon," CrowdStrike's own product. An model running on the attacker's hardware is one no vendor can cut off. SourcesAB
Sources
- AVAPOR PANDA Uses AI-Driven ARTEX to Scale a Global Espionage Campaign (CrowdStrike)crowdstrike.com
- BChina-linked hackers used AI to target 200 organizations, CrowdStrike says (NBC News)nbcnews.com
This story ran in the Morning Brief of October 30th 2026.