MAL-2026-12421 Malicious code in pvm-autodoc (npm)
- Package
- pvm-autodoc
- Registry
- npm
What is MAL-2026-12421?
MAL-2026-12421 is a malicious package in pvm-autodoc, published on 5 Aug 2026.
Official description
On require('pvm-autodoc'), index.js loads bridge.js which downloads a platform-specific native binary from one of four hardcoded Cloudflare Workers subdomains (oob-worker.cf99-9b3.workers.dev, oob-worker.cf103-070.workers.dev, oob-worker.cf101-adf.workers.dev, oob-worker.cf102-baf.workers.dev), with a DNS TXT base64 chunked fallback under *.dl.well1.site. The destination hostnames are constructed by string-splitting and joining at runtime to evade static analysis. The fetched bytes are written to /var/tmp/.cache<hex> on POSIX or %TEMP%\dotnet_diag_<hex>.exe on Windows (a name mimicking a Microsoft diagnostic tool), chmod 0755'd, and spawned detached via /bin/sh -c or cmd /c start. Opt-out variables and file naming are framed as 'analytics'/'telemetry' while the actual behavior is fetch-and-execute of an unpinned, unverified opaque native binary. A second file, lib/telemetry.js, is shipped in the tarball with the same fetch-decode-chmod-spawn primitives using concatenated API names ('child_'+'process', 'chmod'+'Sync') as a companion payload.
Any computer that has this package installed or running should be considered fully compromised. All secrets and keys stored on that computer should be rotated immediately from a different computer. The package should be removed, but as full control of the computer may have been given to an outside entity, there is no guarantee that removing the package will remove all malicious software resulting from installing it.
What should I do about MAL-2026-12421?
Remove the package from your dependencies and lockfiles, then rotate any secrets on machines where it was installed.
Sources
Also known as GHSA-9352-468r-x8fr.