Suspected Chinese hackers tampered with widely used Canadian chat program, say researchers

CrowdStrike researchers believe the malicious software was in circulation for a couple of days but wouldn’t say how many companies had been affected, divulging only that “entities across a range of industries” were hit

Suspected Chinese hackers tampered with widely used software distributed by a small Canadian customer service company, in another example of a “supply chain compromise” made infamous by the hack on U.S. networking company SolarWinds.

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U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike will say in an upcoming blog post seen by Reuters that it had discovered malicious software being distributed by Vancouver-based Comm100, which provides customer service products, such as chat bots and social media management tools, to a range of clients around the globe.

The scope and scale of the hack wasn't immediately clear. In a message, Comm100 said it had fixed its software earlier Thursday and that more details would soon be forthcoming. The company did not immediately respond to follow-up requests for information.

CrowdStrike researchers believe the malicious software was in circulation for a couple of days but wouldn’t say how many companies had been affected, divulging only that “entities across a range of industries” were hit.

Comm100 on its website said it had more than 15,000 customers in some 80 countries.

CrowdStrike executive Adam Meyers said in a telephone interview that the hackers involved were suspected to be Chinese, citing the hackers’ patterns of behaviour, language in the code, and the fact that one of the hack's victims had repeatedly been targeted by Chinese hackers in the past.