MAL-2026-6273 Malicious code in zod-pino (npm)
- Package
- zod-pino
- Registry
- npm
What is MAL-2026-6273?
MAL-2026-6273 is a malicious package in zod-pino, published on 22 Jun 2026.
Official description
The package is published under a name suggesting a Pino logger integration for Zod, but the tarball contents do not match that purpose and exhibit multiple installer-harm fingerprints:
- scripts/postinstall-agent.mjs runs at install time and performs outbound network activity (GET requests, ping/host probing, identifier collection). A logging-schema package has no legitimate reason to ship a postinstall agent that beacons out.
- dist/discordRelayUpload.js implements POST-based upload flows with base64 encoding/decoding of payloads and host-reachability probes (ping) — a Discord-channel relay used for off-host data delivery, unrelated to the package's advertised purpose.
- dist/secretScan/contentScanner.js and dist/secretScan/agentStartupAudit.js implement a secret-scanning routine that fetches huggingface.co endpoints from an 'agent startup audit' code path, with base64 buffer handling consistent with credential extraction and transmission.
- dist/hfCredentials.js handles base64-encoded Hugging Face credentials, and dist/deploymentDefaults.js plus scripts/encode-deployment.mjs perform multi-stage base64 decoding of deployment payloads — typical staged-payload obfuscation.
- dist/relayServer.js bundles a long-lived relay/server component with repeated host-probe (ping) primitives.
Taken together — install-time agent with outbound traffic, secret-scanning + credential modules, base64-staged deployment payloads, and a Discord upload relay, all in a package nominally advertised as a zod/pino integration — the shipped behavior matches an exfiltration/relay toolchain rather than a logging utility. Installing this package triggers the postinstall agent automatically.
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-2026-6273?
Remove the package from your dependencies and lockfiles, then rotate any secrets on machines where it was installed.
Sources
Also known as GHSA-q52v-x293-p999.