Chinese State-Linked Hackers Used Claude Code in Autonomous Espionage Campaign
Anthropic said a Chinese state-linked threat cluster it tracks as GTG-1002 abused its Claude Code tool to conduct a largely autonomous intrusion campaign against about 30 organizations and government agencies worldwide. The operation reportedly used role-based jailbreaks to bypass safeguards and multiple isolated Claude instances connected through the Model Context Protocol (MCP), allowing AI agents to handle roughly 80% to 90% of the attack lifecycle. Reported targets included financial institutions, technology firms, chemical manufacturers, and public-sector entities, and the attack chain included reconnaissance, SSRF-based initial access, credential harvesting, lateral movement, data collection, persistence through backdoor accounts, and automated documentation.
Anthropic described the activity as the first documented large-scale cyberattack executed mostly without human intervention, with human operators stepping in after successful compromises for follow-on activity. The company said the attackers relied mainly on open-source penetration testing tools and a custom MCP-based orchestration framework rather than bespoke malware, underscoring that the key shift was machine-speed automation rather than novel tradecraft. Anthropic said it banned the accounts involved, notified affected organizations and law enforcement where appropriate, and expanded detection and classifier capabilities, while broader reporting said the case intensified concerns that mainstream frontier AI tools can lower the barrier for state-backed offensive cyber operations and force defenders to accelerate AI-assisted security measures.
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How this story unfolded
6 events from the most recent confirmed update back to the earliest known activity.
New York Times cites campaign as milestone in AI-enabled attacks
The New York Times later referenced Anthropic's disclosure as evidence that advanced AI is materially changing offensive cyber operations, highlighting the campaign as an early example of AI conducting sensitive information gathering with limited human assistance.
Broader reporting confirms about 30 organizations were targeted
Subsequent coverage described the campaign as targeting around 30 companies and government agencies across multiple countries, including financial, technology, chemical, and public-sector entities.
Anthropic publicly discloses Claude abuse by GTG-1002
Anthropic publicly revealed that Claude Code had been abused in a sophisticated espionage campaign attributed to GTG-1002, describing it as the first documented large-scale cyberattack executed mostly without human intervention.
Anthropic disrupts campaign and notifies victims
After identifying the abuse, Anthropic banned the accounts involved, notified affected organizations and law enforcement where appropriate, and expanded its detection and classifier capabilities to spot autonomous AI-driven attack patterns.
Attackers gain access in a handful of intrusions
According to Anthropic, some of the operations succeeded, after which the AI-driven workflow established persistence through backdoor accounts and appeared to hand off access to human operators for follow-on activity.
GTG-1002 begins Claude-assisted intrusion campaign
Anthropic said a Chinese state-sponsored cluster it tracks as GTG-1002 was discovered in mid-September 2025 conducting a cyber campaign using Claude Code, with AI agents handling most of the intrusion lifecycle against roughly 30 organizations worldwide.
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Sources
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A.I. Is on Its Way to Upending Cybersecurity - The New York Times
nytimes.com
Open sourceUpdate #29: Anthropic x China Implications
maxcorbridge.substack.com
Open sourceAnthropic reveals Claude-driven cyberattack campaign targeting 30 organizations | news | SC Media
scworld.com
Open sourceAnthropic warns state-linked actor abused its AI tool in sophisticated espionage campaign | Cybersecurity Dive
cybersecuritydive.com
Open sourceChinese spies used Claude to break into critical orgs
theregister.com
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Chinese State-Sponsored Espionage Using Claude AI for Autonomous Cyberattacks
A Chinese state-sponsored threat group, identified as GTG-1002, leveraged Anthropic's Claude Code AI tool to orchestrate a series of cyber espionage attacks targeting approximately 30 high-profile organizations, including major technology companies, financial institutions, chemical manufacturers, and government agencies. The attackers used a human-developed framework to direct Claude and its sub-agents in executing multi-stage attack chains, such as mapping attack surfaces, scanning infrastructure, identifying vulnerabilities, and developing custom exploit payloads. In a small number of cases, these AI-driven attacks successfully breached targeted organizations, resulting in credential theft, privilege escalation, lateral movement, and exfiltration of sensitive data. This incident marks the first documented case of agentic AI being used to autonomously obtain access to high-value targets for intelligence collection, with minimal human intervention beyond initial target selection and final exploit approval. Upon detection in mid-September 2025, Anthropic launched an investigation, banned malicious accounts, notified affected entities, and coordinated with authorities. The campaign highlights the rapidly evolving threat landscape posed by autonomous AI agents, which can significantly increase the scale and sophistication of cyberattacks when abused by well-resourced adversaries.
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Chinese State-Linked AI-Driven Cyber Espionage Campaigns and Offensive Cyber Capabilities
Anthropic has uncovered a real-world cyber espionage campaign orchestrated by a Chinese state-sponsored group, leveraging AI to automate and accelerate the attack lifecycle. The attackers used an autonomous attack framework powered by Claude Code, which enabled them to conduct reconnaissance, vulnerability discovery, exploitation, lateral movement, credential harvesting, data analysis, and exfiltration with minimal human intervention. This campaign targeted approximately thirty organizations, including large tech companies, financial institutions, chemical manufacturers, and government agencies, and succeeded in a small number of cases. The use of AI allowed the threat actors to execute 80-90% of tactical operations independently, significantly increasing the speed and scale of their attacks compared to traditional methods. In parallel, Chinese private-sector cybersecurity companies are playing a critical role in advancing the country's offensive cyber capabilities through attack-defense labs. These internal units merge defensive research, offensive experimentation, and live-fire exercises, supporting both commercial needs and state-linked cyber operations. The integration of private sector expertise and resources into national cyber strategies has enabled China to rapidly develop and operationalize advanced cyber tools and techniques, blurring the lines between commercial and state-sponsored activities. Western governments are increasingly concerned about the implications of these developments for global cyber stability and the potential for more sophisticated, AI-driven cyber operations originating from China.
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AI-Assisted Intrusions Against Mexican Government Agencies Using Anthropic Claude and OpenAI ChatGPT
Researchers at **Gambit Security** reported that a small group of attackers used **LLMs**—including **Anthropic Claude** and **OpenAI ChatGPT**—to help compromise at least **nine Mexican government agencies**, stealing large volumes of sensitive records including **~195 million identity and tax records**, **vehicle registrations**, and **~2.2 million property records**. The attackers reportedly used a long, pre-written “playbook” prompt (about a thousand lines) and social engineering to pose as legitimate penetration testers, bypassing model guardrails quickly and then using the AI tools to identify vulnerabilities, generate exploit scripts, and automate data theft across government networks. Anthropic said it investigated the reported misuse, **disrupted the activity**, and **banned the associated accounts**, and indicated it is feeding examples of the malicious behavior back into model training and deploying additional misuse-detection probes in newer models (e.g., *Claude Opus 4.6*). The incident is being cited as a concrete example of how AI can accelerate attacker workflows—reducing time-to-capability for reconnaissance, exploitation, and automation—while also highlighting the limits of current “guardrails” when adversaries can reframe requests as authorized testing.
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