This is 3 weeks back, folks. It WAS real repository compromise - it made it to Zod's main, but not to npm.
On September 21, someone used Colin's git credentials to push this compromised code into the project, Colin caught it, and reverted it that same day (PR #6620). He subsequently did release 4.6.6 on October 11, but it did NOT contain the infected code.
Btw, Zod wasn't the only package targeted - same attack was attempted against standard-schema and nub. Nub DID make it to npm, but npm's malware scanning blocked it.
Looks like a legit (well, illegitimate) attempted supply-chain attack, but no actual Zod release was compromised.
Viewed through the lens of Zod's responsibilities and processes I'd say a release was absolutely compromised. They cut and submitted a compromised release to npm; npm just happened to block the publishing.
Might is pretty tame, it is infected - EDIT: title was changed, it said "might be infected".
The malware seems to inject some JS payload to execute when zod is installed, by fetching it from an ethereum smart contract (if I understand it correctly).
Interestingly, they added the `preinstall` key (that is supposed to run the malicious script when installed) under the package.json root, and not under `scripts`, so from what I can tell this wouldn't run on install.
Otherwise, yeah, this seems like a stage-1 loader for fetching and running a payload off the Ethereum mainnet.
That is 100% a compromised repo. It's a malware downloader.
I feel like they could have done a better job here. Having just a few changes, one of which is a huge blob of blatantly compromising code, is just too obvious.
The URLs are interesting, I don't do anything in this area but I didn't know that you could use the blockchains to hide your command and control URL, in a way that allows you to remotely update the URL whenever you want. It turns out there is a use for blockchain! Making control URLs immune to takedowns!
Just pasted the code into claude to try and decipher the minified js and looks like it tries to find the server via the blockchain? and then download further stuff from there.
> Seems like a git push credential of some kind was compromised, not an npm or GitHub token. Still working with the GitHub team to get some better forensics on what/how. The attack consisted of malicious commits and tagged pushes to main.
So it didn't go through review, it was pushed straight to main. It also seems their publishing pipeline was already secured against this sort of thing:
> Zod's release flow was already secured against kind of attack via trusted publishing and a dedicated GitHub environment for secure deployments. Zod's release CI worked as designed and was already secure against this; NPM's malware scanning didn't prevent any malicious here.
The compromised code wasn't actually released. This write-up has a lot of information:
https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/208477
Close call, nevertheless, it's silly to keep that commit on the release page.
It's silly to not have rewritten it out of git history.
This is 3 weeks back, folks. It WAS real repository compromise - it made it to Zod's main, but not to npm.
On September 21, someone used Colin's git credentials to push this compromised code into the project, Colin caught it, and reverted it that same day (PR #6620). He subsequently did release 4.6.6 on October 11, but it did NOT contain the infected code.
Btw, Zod wasn't the only package targeted - same attack was attempted against standard-schema and nub. Nub DID make it to npm, but npm's malware scanning blocked it.
Looks like a legit (well, illegitimate) attempted supply-chain attack, but no actual Zod release was compromised.
Viewed through the lens of Zod's responsibilities and processes I'd say a release was absolutely compromised. They cut and submitted a compromised release to npm; npm just happened to block the publishing.
No it was never published. Only `nubjs/nub` was. You can read more on the write-up -> https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/208477
nowhere in gp's comment do they claim it was published
Might is pretty tame, it is infected - EDIT: title was changed, it said "might be infected".
The malware seems to inject some JS payload to execute when zod is installed, by fetching it from an ethereum smart contract (if I understand it correctly).
Don't forget to flag the version on npm.
EDIT: looks like the update never got on NPM: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50053253
Right, 3 seconds in, as soon as I saw “ethereum” in a typescript validator the first thought was the same.
The most recent version 4.6.6 has a very interesting commit (d821685) "Fix bugs and improve performance", that contain the following changes https://github.com/colinhacks/zod/commit/d821685ea6732436fcd...
I didn't study what packages/mini/meta.test.mjs is doing in particular but it's not looking great
Not looking great is an understatement. You should raise more alarms at github. And people should try to reach the maintainers.
This might be a hint:
I haven’t downloaded the tarball to verify, but it looks like it was reverted prior to the GitHub release:
https://github.com/colinhacks/zod/commit/10dda3a3a4bc76ed0bf...
Interestingly, they added the `preinstall` key (that is supposed to run the malicious script when installed) under the package.json root, and not under `scripts`, so from what I can tell this wouldn't run on install.
Otherwise, yeah, this seems like a stage-1 loader for fetching and running a payload off the Ethereum mainnet.
Great reminder to always disable these scripts unless going through the hassle to verify if it does something absolutely useful.
> colinHACKs
name checks out
I have many projects using this library. do u think the situtation is urgent, a code red? I will need to talk to clients accordingly.
Never made it to npm you're fine
That is 100% a compromised repo. It's a malware downloader.
I feel like they could have done a better job here. Having just a few changes, one of which is a huge blob of blatantly compromising code, is just too obvious.
The URLs are interesting, I don't do anything in this area but I didn't know that you could use the blockchains to hide your command and control URL, in a way that allows you to remotely update the URL whenever you want. It turns out there is a use for blockchain! Making control URLs immune to takedowns!
Yep, def looks bad.
Just pasted the code into claude to try and decipher the minified js and looks like it tries to find the server via the blockchain? and then download further stuff from there.
Don’t even need to go that far, it refers to ethereum in plain text.
This is so bad it doesn't even try to hide itself.
What are we looking at exactly? Gia Tan situation? Prompt injection?
classic crypto people doing classic crypto things
malicious remote-code loader
How is this even possible? The change is small and literally has an ethereum URL in the code changes. How did it go through?
From the repo owner:
> Seems like a git push credential of some kind was compromised, not an npm or GitHub token. Still working with the GitHub team to get some better forensics on what/how. The attack consisted of malicious commits and tagged pushes to main.
So it didn't go through review, it was pushed straight to main. It also seems their publishing pipeline was already secured against this sort of thing:
> Zod's release flow was already secured against kind of attack via trusted publishing and a dedicated GitHub environment for secure deployments. Zod's release CI worked as designed and was already secure against this; NPM's malware scanning didn't prevent any malicious here.
LGTM