Cyberattack with AI agents aimed at Taiwanese government agencies

ANDm reported, the Cyber Security Administration of Taiwan explained that its monitoring unit detected cyberattacks last month, and the National Cyber Security Institute began issuing alerts as of July 20, reported the CNA agency.

After detection, an immediate investigation was launched to determine the origin, methods and scope of the attacks, with the containment responses already completed by the affected agencies, indicated the ministry without revealing the exact provenance of the aggression.

According to the British Financial Times, IA Dream's Israeli startup investigators were the first to detect the intrusion.

The report said that cybercriminals used open source AI agents to create an autonomous hacking tool, citing a source close to the subject that confirmed Taiwan was the target.

The tool committed at least 85 government user accounts and extracted more than 2,500 employee records before attackers expanded operations to the Taiwan nuclear security agency and to at least seven energy companies.

Although Dream did not assign the attack to a specific group, researchers pointed out that the internal communications associated with the operation were written in simplified Chinese, which suggests that operators would probably be linked to China.

In turn, MODA confirmed that the attacks showed clear signs of originating abroad and involved a hybrid approach, combining conventional techniques with AI agents such as OpenClaw.

According to the body, AI agents can quickly combine multiple attack techniques and use secondary systems – such as backups and test systems – as trampoline, making attacks faster, cheaper and scalable.

The Taiwanese Government has also ensured that it has already established guidelines to address AI-related emerging cybersecurity threats and that it will continue to strengthen global defenses and monitoring potential attack routes.

Chinese cyberattacks against Taiwan’s critical infrastructure – from hospitals to banks – rose by 6% last year compared to the previous year, reaching an average of 2.63 million attacks a day, revealed the Thai National Security Department in January, adding that some of the intrusions were synchronized with military exercises under “hybrid threats”.

The Beijing authorities have always considered Taiwan as an “inalienable part” of Chinese territory and do not exclude the use of force to achieve the “reunification” of the island and continent, one of the long-term objectives outlined by Chinese President Xi Jinping after his arrival in power in 2012.

A report from the National Center for Response to Computer Virus Emergencies in China stated in June that groups of hackers supported by Taiwan launched “phishing attacks” against maritime institutions in the coastal regions of mainland China last year to “steal maritime information and anticipate the operational plans of the Chinese military.”.

At the same time the Public Security Office of the city of Canton, in southeast China, which offered rewards to anyone who helped capture more than 20 people allegedly linked to the Taiwanese entity, who accuses of being behind cyber attacks against a Chinese technology company.

The island's Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command classified the search and capture warrants as an “orphaned operation” that “reveals an authoritarian and coercive attitude” of the Chinese Communist Party (PCC) “to intimidate the people of Taiwan”.