Shadows in the Virtual Realm: How Chinese Hackers Breached VMware’s Core Defenses
In the shadowy world of cyber espionage, a new chapter unfolded this week with revelations about sophisticated attacks targeting virtualization infrastructure. Chinese-linked hackers have been exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities in VMware’s ESXi hypervisor, allowing them to break out of virtual machines and seize control at the hypervisor level. This development, detailed in recent reports, underscores the persistent threats facing enterprise IT environments. According to cybersecurity researchers, these actors gained initial access through compromised SonicWall VPN appliances, then deployed exploit toolkits that chained multiple flaws for devastating effect.
The attacks came to light through analysis by firms like Huntress, which disrupted one such intrusion. The exploit toolkit appears to have been in use for over a year before the vulnerabilities were publicly disclosed, suggesting a…
