ARTEX developer closes source after CrowdStrike links agent to South Korean bank hacks
Since late September, South Korean financial firms have suffered a string of cyberattacks and data leaks, prompting the country's financial regulator to hold an emergency meeting and demand an investigation; CrowdStrike said on October 7 that suspected China-linked hackers were combining AI with penetration-testing tools. According to Reuters, the Chinese developer of the AI agent ARTEX — which was identified as being used to hack South Korean banks — said it has converted the project to closed source.
Why it matters: An AI agent being linked to real-world attacks and then pulled behind closed doors highlights the security and governance pressure created by agent misuse.
References Techmeme · The Information · iThome 台湾
圖片來源:
CrowdStrike
自9月底以來，韓國金融業接連發生網路攻擊與個資外洩事件，促使韓國金融主管機關召開緊急會議並要求徹查，資安業者CrowdStrike於10月7日揭露，發現疑似使用中文的攻擊者可能涉及前述事件，該攻擊者於9月底至10月初利用中國開發的AI滲透測試工具ARTEX搭配大型語言模型（LLM），攻擊韓國金融機構並竊取資料，其活動時間與針對的目標，與前述韓國金融業個資外洩事件重疊，顯示其可能與前述金融業資安事件有關。
CrowdStrike在攻擊者控制的伺服器取得Claude Code工作紀錄、ARTEX設定及Claude記憶體檔案，從中發現攻擊者曾透過Claude查詢韓國外洩資料的交易管道，並要求協助製作資安相關履歷，該攻擊者使用的ARTEX以DeepSeek v4.1-flash作為主要LLM後端，攻擊者另在Claude Code工作階段使用GLM-5.3與Grok 4.6等模型輔助。CrowdStrike認為攻擊者可能使用中文，且具有經濟動機，但僅有中等信心，尚未將活動歸因於特定攻擊組織。
How we got here
- Anthropic launches Cyber Mission, CIDP for critical infrastructure, free OSS ScannerAnthropic · News · CrowdStrike
- CrowdStrike links South Korean bank breaches to AI tool ARTEX, Claude CodeTechRepublic · ARTEX