MAL-2026-13366 Malicious code in @workoscalif/sudoku (npm)
Malicious package
Published
MAL-2026-13366 is a malicious package: @workoscalif/sudoku (npm). Every version was published to cause harm.
Task:
1. Search this repository's dependency manifests and lockfiles for the package, including transitive dependencies.
2. If it is present, remove it, regenerate the lockfile with the project's package manager, and replace whatever it was used for.
3. List any CI runners, developer machines or containers that installed it, so their secrets can be rotated.
4. If the package is not used anywhere, say so and change nothing.
Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/MAL-2026-13366/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/MAL-2026-13366/index.md)
- Package
- @workoscalif/sudoku
- Registry
- npm
What is MAL-2026-13366?
MAL-2026-13366 is a malicious package in @workoscalif/sudoku, published on 5 Aug 2026.
Official description
package.json declares a postinstall script that spawns vendor/gridgen-linux-x64 during
npm install. The README describes this file as a ~34 kB static ELF built from a ~150-line C sudoku generator (native/gridgen.c), but the shipped artifact is a ~33.6 MB Go runtime executable (strings include runtime., reflect., GODEBUG, chacha8, godebugs.Info) — roughly 1000x the advertised size and a different language/toolchain than the shipped source. The binary contains /proc/self/cgroup and /proc/self/mountinfo strings, which are container/CI environment fingerprints unrelated to generating sudoku puzzles. The postinstall short-circuits unless process.platform === 'linux' && process.arch === 'x64' and honors SUDOKU_SKIP_POSTINSTALL=1, so developer laptops (macOS/Windows) and reviewers using --ignore-scripts do not execute the binary. The npm scope @workoscalif visually resembles the WorkOS authentication vendor while the package is an unrelated personal project (author anas cherni, homepage github.com/anascherni/sudoku), increasing the likelihood a developer installs it believing it is vendor-endorsed. The combination of a documentation/contents mismatch, a large opaque binary from an unrelated toolchain, Linux-x64/CI gating, container fingerprinting strings, and a scope resembling a known vendor is the opaque-native-binary dropper shape rather than the advertised C sudoku helper.What should I do about MAL-2026-13366?
Remove the package from your dependencies and lockfiles, then rotate any secrets on machines where it was installed.