Google recently announced it uncovered a hijacking scam based out of China.

The company's engineer director for its security team, Eric Grosse, said because of its cloud-based security system, it uncovered a phishing attack originating from Jinan, China. The company said bad actors used malware and phishing scams to trick hundreds of users including senior U.S. government officials, Chinese political activists, officials in several Asian countries into collecting their passwords.

Account hijackings are typically used to steal financial data or simply send spam. Usually they are not targeted at individuals and just done en masse, however this one may have been more targeted Google says.

The goal of this effort seems to have been to monitor the contents of these users' emails, with the perpetrators apparently using stolen passwords to change peoples' forwarding and delegation settings, Grosse said in a blog post.

In the past, the relationship between Google and China has been shaky at best. In 2010, all searching via Google including mobile was banned in mainland China. Google moved its China Internet search service to Hong Kong during the qualm. The ban was eventually lifted, but certain search terms are still banned in the country.

Here's a look back at the history of China vs. Google.

China vs. Google
People in China were supportive of Google’s actions, and displayed this through cards and flowers. Reuters
China vs. Google
A cleaner sweeps the logo of Google China outside its company headquarters in Beijing. This came was taken in January of 2010 when Google was investigating whether one or more employees may have helped facilitate a cyber attack from China that the U.S search giant said it was a victim of in mid-December, Reuters
China vs. Google
This photo, taken in March 2010, is of the Chinese national flag waves in front of the Google logo on the top of its China headquarters. It was taken after China's state media on Sunday accused Google Inc of pushing a political agenda by "groundlessly accusing the Chinese government.” Reuters
China vs. Google
During the war of words between China and Google, the Chinese state media claimed a U.S. conspiracy and said China can live without Google. Reuters
China vs. Google
Another security guard in front of Google China during the company’s strife with the country in March 2010. Reuters
China vs. Google
Top Chinese Internet search firm Baidu Inc. benefit from the qualm between China and Google. The search firm smashed quarterly profit forecasts as advertisers flocked to its new keyword system Reuters
China vs. Google
In this photo, taken in March 2010, security guards try to stop the media in front of the Google China headquarters building in Beijing. This came after Google moved its China Internet search service to Hong Kong in a bid to resolve its dispute with Beijing over censored search results. Google said it was no longer willing to cooperate with China in regards to censored results. Reuters
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