G0030: Lotus Blossom
Lotus Blossom is a long-standing threat group largely targeting various entities in Asia since at least 2009. In addition to government and related targets, Lotus Blossom has also targeted entities such as digital certificate issuers.[1][2][3]
Security context for executives and security teams
G0030: Lotus Blossom describes [Lotus Blossom](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0030) is a long-standing threat group largely targeting various entities in Asia since at least 2009. In addition to government and related targets, [Lotus Blossom](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0030) has also targeted entities such as digital certificate issuers.(Citation: Lotus Blossom Jun 2015)(Citation: Symantec Bilbug 2022)(Citation: Cisco LotusBlossom 2025)
Executive priority
G0030: Lotus Blossom is an official MITRE ATT&CK group. Glexia treats it as defensive behavior context for prioritizing monitoring, control validation, and response planning without using the object by itself as an attribution claim.
Technical view
Security teams should validate G0030: Lotus Blossom by reviewing the official ATT&CK relationships, mapped tactics (the mapped ATT&CK tactic context), supported platforms (the platforms named in the official object), and available local telemetry before making detection or mitigation decisions.
Likely telemetry
- Official ATT&CK relationships and object metadata
Detection direction
- Validate whether G0030: Lotus Blossom appears in your detection coverage and tabletop scenarios.
- Use the object to align executive risk language with SOC, incident response, and detection engineering work.
- Do not treat ATT&CK relationship context as attribution without corroborating evidence.
Mitigation priorities
- Map the object to existing controls and identify missing telemetry or response ownership.
- Prioritize mitigations that reduce exposure on the listed platforms and tactics.
- Review adjacent ATT&CK relationships before changing policy, detections, or reporting language.
Additional notes and limits
Baseline Glexia take generated from the official MITRE ATT&CK STIX object, source hash, tactics, platforms, and detection fields. It is safe to replace with a richer model-generated take for the same source hash later.
This baseline take is source-grounded and schema-validated, but it does not include environment-specific telemetry, incident evidence, or threat-intelligence corroboration.
Generated from the cited source records. This long-tail analysis has not been individually reviewed by a named human.
Lotus Blossom
Lotus Blossom is a long-standing threat group largely targeting various entities in Asia since at least 2009. In addition to government and related targets, Lotus Blossom has also targeted entities such as digital certificate issuers.[1][2][3]
How security teams should use this page
Treat this object as behavior context, not an attribution claim. Validate the related groups, software, data sources, and mitigations against official ATT&CK relationships and your own telemetry before making control-coverage decisions.
Techniques used
This mirrors the MITRE pattern of making group, software, campaign, and technique relationships scannable. Relationship notes come from mirrored ATT&CK relationship text when available.
| Domain | ID | Name | Relationship / procedure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enterprise | T1016 | System Network Configuration Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used commands such as `ipconfig` and `netstat` to gather network information on compromised hosts.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1543.003 | Windows ServiceSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has configured tools such as Sagerunex to run as Windows services.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1087.002 | Domain AccountSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used `net` commands and tools such as AdFind to profile domain accounts associated with victim machines and make Active Directory queries.[3][2] |
| Enterprise | T1074.001 | Local Data StagingSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has locally staged compressed and archived data for follow-on exfiltration.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1134 | Access Token Manipulation | Lotus Blossom has retrieved process tokens for processes to adjust the privileges of the launch process or other items.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1087.001 | Local AccountSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used commands such as `net` to profile local system users.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1090.001 | Internal ProxySub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used publicly available tools such as the Venom proxy tool to proxy traffic out of victim environments.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1539 | Steal Web Session Cookie | Lotus Blossom has used publicly-available tools to steal cookies from browsers such as Chrome.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1112 | Modify Registry | Lotus Blossom has installed tools such as Sagerunex by writing them to the Windows registry.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1049 | System Network Connections Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used commands such as `netstat` to identify system network connections.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1047 | Windows Management Instrumentation | Lotus Blossom has used WMI to enable lateral movement.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1482 | Domain Trust Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used tools such as AdFind to make Active Directory queries.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1016.001 | Internet Connection DiscoverySub-technique | Lotus Blossom has performed checks to determine if a victim machine is able to access the Internet.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1090.003 | Multi-hop ProxySub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used tools such as the publicly available HTran tool for proxying traffic in victim environments.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1588.002 | ToolSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used publicly-available tools such as a Python-based cookie stealer for Chrome browsers, Impacket, and the Venom proxy tool.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1018 | Remote System Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used Ping to identify remote systems.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1083 | File and Directory Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used commands such as `dir` to examine the local filesystem of victim machines.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1560.003 | Archive via Custom MethodSub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used custom tools to compress and archive data on victim systems.[3] |
| Enterprise | T1560.001 | Archive via UtilitySub-technique | Lotus Blossom has used WinRAR for compressing data in RAR format.[3][2] |
| Enterprise | T1046 | Network Service Discovery | Lotus Blossom has used port scanners to enumerate services on remote hosts.[2] |
| Enterprise | T1012 | Query Registry | Lotus Blossom has run commands such as `reg query HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\[service name]\Parameters` to verify if installed implants are running as a service.[3] |
Groups, software, and campaigns
S0552: AdFind
S0097: Ping
S0357: Impacket
S0082: Emissary
Emissary is a Trojan that has been used by Lotus Blossom. It shares code with Elise, with both Trojans being part of a malware group referred to as LStudio.[1]
S0081: Elise
Elise is a custom backdoor Trojan that appears to be used exclusively by Lotus Blossom. It is part of a larger group of tools referred to as LStudio, ST Group, and APT0LSTU.[1][2]
S1211: Hannotog
Hannotog is a type of backdoor malware uniquely assoicated with Lotus Blossom operations since at least 2022.[1]
S0590: NBTscan
S1210: Sagerunex
Sagerunex is a malware family exclusively associated with Lotus Blossom operations, with variants existing since at least 2016. Variations of Sagerunex leverage non-traditional command and control mechanisms such as various web services.[1][2]
S0160: certutil
All related ATT&CK context
Object version and sync metadata
The fields below describe the current mirrored snapshot. When Glexia retains multiple ATT&CK source imports, you can open the table to compare the same object across releases (hashes and MITRE timestamps). For MITRE’s own release notes and roadmap, see ATT&CK resources — Updates.
Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases(2)
| Release | Bundle imported | Object version | Modified | Status | Raw hash |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19.2 | 4.0 | Current bundle | 38effe43073a… | ||
| 19.1 | 4.0 | Older bundle | 4b877ae53b8c… |
Mirrored ATT&CK source object
The raw object is retained through the mirrored ATT&CK source bundle and object hash. The raw endpoint returns the exact object from the mirrored bundle when available.
External references and citations
MITRE external references are preserved separately from Glexia analysis so citations remain traceable to their original source records.
- [1]Lotus Blossom Jun 2015
Falcone, R., et al.. (2015, June 16). Operation Lotus Blossom. Retrieved February 15, 2016.
Open source URL - [2]Symantec Bilbug 2022
Symntec Threat Hunter Team. (2022, November 12). Billbug: State-sponsored Actor Targets Cert Authority, Government Agencies in Multiple Asian Countries. Retrieved March 15, 2025.
Open source URL - [3]Cisco LotusBlossom 2025
Joey Chen, Cisco Talos. (2025, February 27). Lotus Blossom espionage group targets multiple industries with different versions of Sagerunex and hacking tools. Retrieved March 15, 2025.
Open source URL - [4]Spring Dragon Jun 2015
Baumgartner, K.. (2015, June 17). The Spring Dragon APT. Retrieved February 15, 2016.
Open source URL - [5]Accenture Dragonfish Jan 2018
Accenture Security. (2018, January 27). DRAGONFISH DELIVERS NEW FORM OF ELISE MALWARE TARGETING ASEAN DEFENCE MINISTERS’ MEETING AND ASSOCIATES. Retrieved November 17, 2024.
Open source URL - [6]Bilbug
(Citation: Symantec Bilbug 2022)
- [7]DRAGONFISH
(Citation: Accenture Dragonfish Jan 2018)
- [8]Lotus Blossom
(Citation: Lotus Blossom Jun 2015)(Citation: Accenture Dragonfish Jan 2018)
- [9]Microsoft Threat Actor Naming July 2023
Microsoft . (2023, July 12). How Microsoft names threat actors. Retrieved November 17, 2023.
Open source URL - [10]RADIUM
(Citation: Microsoft Threat Actor Naming July 2023)
- [11]Raspberry Typhoon
(Citation: Microsoft Threat Actor Naming July 2023)
- [12]Spring Dragon
(Citation: Spring Dragon Jun 2015)(Citation: Accenture Dragonfish Jan 2018)
- [13]Thrip
(Citation: Cisco LotusBlossom 2025)
- [14]mitre-attackG0030Open source URL
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