MAL-2026-5450 Malicious code in o3forms (npm)
- Package
- o3forms
- Registry
- npm
What is MAL-2026-5450?
MAL-2026-5450 is a malicious package in o3forms, published on 9 Jun 2026.
Official description
The package name impersonates the OpenMRS O3 forms ecosystem (legitimate packages are published under the @openmrs/ scope). package.json declares an optionalDependency o3forms-utils resolved as github:core-modules-lab/o3forms-utils#76c1c55 — code fetched directly from GitHub, outside npm registry scanning. index.js (lines 1-4) wraps require('o3forms-utils') in a try/catch that silently swallows errors, so the off-registry payload executes on every consumer import with no visible failure if anything goes wrong. The package.json bin field maps 11 ubiquitous dev-tool names (webpack, vite, eslint, tsc, next, jest, prettier, nodemon, turbo, ts-node, webpack-cli) all to index.js, so any hoisted invocation of those commands (e.g. npx webpack) launches this package's loader and triggers the GitHub fetch+execute. Additional attacker-hygiene tells: version 99.1.99 (version-squat to outrank legitimate releases), config.unsafe-perm: true to keep root during npm scripts, and a placeholder OpenMRS Community Contributor author with no homepage. Installing or loading this package — or running any of the hijacked dev-tool commands in a project where it is hoisted — executes attacker-controlled code from a mutable GitHub commit.
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-2026-5450?
Remove the package from your dependencies and lockfiles, then rotate any secrets on machines where it was installed.
Sources
Also known as GHSA-gp6v-h28c-4fxf.