MAL-2026-17435 Malicious code in niksinnkatalapp (npm)

niksinnkatalapp is a dependency-confusion package: it takes a name that looks like an internal project, uses an inflated version (100.0.0) so it outranks private-registry versions, and runs node setup.js || true as a preinstall script on npm install. setup.js sends the hostname, username, working directory, OS, architecture, Node.js version and configured npm registry, with a per-package tracking token, in an HTTPS POST to https://s85r5k14qk.execute-api.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/prod/hook. The npm account amel10 published niksinnkatalapp and 9 similar packages within two minutes on 2026-09-30, all with the same setup.js.

The package declares a preinstall hook that runs setup.js on npm install. setup.js collects host identifiers (os.hostname(), os.userInfo().username, process.cwd(), platform, arch, node version, and the configured npm registry) and POSTs them as JSON, together with a hardcoded correlation token, to https://s85r5k14qk.execute-api.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/prod/hook. The advertised purpose is a trivial celsius-to-fahrenheit conversion, which does not require telemetry or network activity. The package name and 100.0.0 version pin are consistent with a dependency-confusion lure intended to win resolution against an internal package name and beacon out from build environments that install it.