Comment Crew, APT 1

Also known as APT1, Comment Crew is an advanced persistent threat (APT) group with links to the Chinese military. The threat actors, which were active from roughly 2006 to 2010, managed to strike over 140 US companies in the quest for sensitive corporate and intellectual property data. The group earned their name through their use of HTML comments to hide communication to the command-and-control servers. The usual attack vector was via spear-phishing campaigns utilizing emails which contained documents with names tailored for the potential victims, such as “ArmyPlansConferenceOnNewGCVSolicitation.pdf,” or “Chinese Oil Executive Learning From Experience.doc.” This group may also be responsible for the Siesta campaign.