MAL-2026-16196

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Import Source
https://github.com/ossf/malicious-packages/blob/main/osv/malicious/npm/chai-as-crack/MAL-2026-16196.json
JSON Data
https://api.osv.dev/v1/vulns/MAL-2026-16196
Published
2026-09-15T16:32:24Z
Modified
2026-09-15T16:46:26Z
Summary
Malicious code in chai-as-crack (npm)
Details

-= Per source details. Do not edit below this line.=-

Source: amazon-inspector (090c71f12df6d5441dce686e54fef42805f1afd6575d48bc0f6263dcf50b2f21)

Package's main entry (index.js) unconditionally requires./lib/config at top level, causing the file to execute on any require('chai-as-crack'). lib/config.js is approximately 4 MB of obfuscator.io-transformed code: a rotating string array of ~23,868 entries with hex-escaped identifiers, multiple decoder wrappers (T, j), and control-flow flattening. The exported middleware is a no-op decoy. Package metadata further disguises the module as the popular pino logger: package.json declares name chai-as-crack with keywords logger/stream/json, while README.md, docs/, index.d.ts, and LICENSE are copied verbatim from pino (linking to github.com/pinojs/pino). Author metadata (Robert King hello@jsonspack.com, bugs URL https://jsonspack.com/issues) is unrelated to pino. The combination of import-time execution of an opaque multi-megabyte payload, heavy obfuscation with no source map or build artifacts, and a cover-story impersonating an unrelated well-known logger matches the loader/dropper shape and gives the publisher arbitrary code execution inside any consumer that imports the package.

Database specific 
{
    "malicious-packages-origins": [
        {
            "id": "IN-MAL-2026-020071",
            "import_time": "2026-09-15T16:41:58.23645445Z",
            "modified_time": "2026-09-15T16:32:24Z",
            "sha256": "090c71f12df6d5441dce686e54fef42805f1afd6575d48bc0f6263dcf50b2f21",
            "source": "amazon-inspector",
            "versions": [
                "7.0.5"
            ]
        }
    ]
}
References
Credits

Affected packages

npm / chai-as-crack

Package

Name
chai-as-crack
View open source insights on deps.dev
Purl
pkg:npm/chai-as-crack

Affected ranges

Affected versions

7.*
7.0.5

Database specific

cwes 
[
    {
        "cweId": "CWE-506",
        "description": "The product contains code that appears to be malicious in nature.",
        "name": "Embedded Malicious Code"
    }
]
indicators 
{
    "evidence_files": [
        {
            "path": "lib/config.js",
            "sha256": "df4970a67c9caae5dd2e4603ea726f7624a4c17bb197a1039985a10ff9b56923",
            "tlsh": "f016818d5685d42381cc2793be057ae9b17ae96684cca447ff74bf1c69bc41bc2a0ed0"
        },
        {
            "path": "package.json",
            "sha256": "d1b1c09d633d667e3a50a0aab253dddf27cdba087e19c76594d3830e9a957db1",
            "tlsh": "1c017b20dab85e6304ed25524c2a06437a654c575528fd1932eb612c4f9d5fb01bf21d"
        }
    ],
    "package_integrity": [
        {
            "filename": "chai-as-crack-7.0.5.tgz",
            "hashes": {
                "sha1": "629a2d74299d234004a72f0db419b2e89db7592e",
                "sha512_sri": "sha512-BFdyXLVWMCEwYo3VBTASRmMSPVXUfYAu8vNttxYXYdkgIMCcfVO9hIwKZ2HAy5uk321ziowPagni55IgzvMOMg=="
            }
        }
    ]
}
source 
"https://github.com/ossf/malicious-packages/blob/main/osv/malicious/npm/chai-as-crack/MAL-2026-16196.json"