GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf

Suggest an improvement
Source
https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf
Import Source
https://github.com/github/advisory-database/blob/main/advisories/github-reviewed/2025/08/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf.json
JSON Data
https://api.osv.dev/v1/vulns/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf
Published
2025-08-26T18:35:10Z
Modified
2025-08-26T18:50:10.972679Z
Summary
Picklescan has a missing detection when calling built-in python trace.Trace.run
Details

Summary

Using trace.Trace.run, which is a built-in python library function to execute remote pickle file.

Details

The attack payload executes in the following steps:

First, the attacker craft the payload by calling to trace.Trace.run function in reduce method Then when the victim after checking whether the pickle file is safe by using Picklescan library and this library doesn't dectect any dangerous functions, decide to pickle.load() this malicious pickle file, thus lead to remote code execution.

PoC

class EvilTraceRun:
    def __reduce__(self):
        from trace import Trace
        payload = "__import__('os').system('whoami')"
        return Trace.run, (Trace(), payload)

Impact

Who is impacted? Any organization or individual relying on picklescan to detect malicious pickle files inside PyTorch models. What is the impact? Attackers can embed malicious code in pickle file that remains undetected but executes when the pickle file is loaded. Supply Chain Attack: Attackers can distribute infected pickle files across ML models, APIs, or saved Python objects.

Corresponding

https://github.com/FredericDT https://github.com/Qhaoduoyu

Database specific
{
    "cwe_ids": [],
    "github_reviewed": true,
    "nvd_published_at": null,
    "severity": "MODERATE",
    "github_reviewed_at": "2025-08-26T18:35:10Z"
}
References

Affected packages

PyPI / picklescan

Package

Affected ranges

Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
0Unknown introduced version / All previous versions are affected
Fixed
0.0.29

Affected versions

0.*
0.0.1
0.0.2
0.0.3
0.0.4
0.0.5
0.0.6
0.0.7
0.0.8
0.0.9
0.0.10
0.0.11
0.0.12
0.0.13
0.0.14
0.0.15
0.0.16
0.0.17
0.0.18
0.0.19
0.0.20
0.0.21
0.0.22
0.0.23
0.0.24
0.0.25
0.0.26
0.0.27
0.0.28

Database specific

source
"https://github.com/github/advisory-database/blob/main/advisories/github-reviewed/2025/08/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf/GHSA-5qwp-399c-mjwf.json"