Chinese state-sponsored hackers conducted cyber-espionage operations targeting various aerospace-related firms for years in an effort to help the county’s advancements in this sector, Crowdstrike reports.
The identified hacking operation started in January 2010, just after the state-owned enterprise Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC) announced it had selected U.S.-based CFM International to provide a custom engine — the LEAP-1C, which is based on the LEAP-X engine — for its C919 aircraft.
According to Crowdstrike, the CJ-1000AX engine produced by the Aero Engine Corporation of China (AECC) bears multiple similarities to the LEAP-1C, which suggests that it benefited from the cyber espionage efforts of China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS).
