Malicious NPM Packages Exfiltrate Hundreds of Developer SSH Keys via GitHub

Two destructive offers learned on the npm package deal registry have been found to leverage GitHub to retailer Base64-encrypted SSH keys stolen from developer techniques on which they ended up put in.

The modules named warbeast2000 and kodiak2k have been printed at the begin of the month, attracting 412 and 1,281 downloads right before they ended up taken down by the npm maintainers. The most latest downloads occurred on January 21, 2024.

Software package supply chain security agency ReversingLabs, which manufactured the discovery, reported there were eight distinct versions of warbeast2000 and extra than 30 variations of kodiak2k.

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Both of those the modules are developed to operate a postinstall script after set up, which is intended to retrieve and execute two different JavaScript data files.

Although warbeast2000 attempts to obtain the personal SSH critical, kodiak2k is developed to glimpse for a vital named “meow,” increasing the possibility that the danger actor probable used a placeholder title during the early levels of the improvement.

“This second phase malicious script reads the personal SSH essential stored in the id_rsa file found in the /.ssh listing,” security researcher Lucija Valentić claimed. “It then uploaded the Foundation64-encoded key to an attacker-managed GitHub repository.”

Subsequent versions of kodiak2k were being found to execute a script discovered in an archived GitHub project hosting the Empire write-up-exploitation framework. The script is capable of launching the Mimikatz hacking device to dump credentials from procedure memory.

“The marketing campaign is just the most up-to-date example of cybercriminals and destructive actors applying open source package deal managers and linked infrastructure to help malicious software program supply chain campaigns that goal progress corporations and close-consumer companies,” Valentić said.

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