MAL-2026-5884

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

Source: amazon-inspector (43b7aa0683f0462d98c9ab789942e329e1298af3f85c0bd3a9b3761f5aebf8fb)

On npm install, the preinstall hook (node lib/setup.js) runs on Windows and invokes lib/worker.js, which downloads an executable to %LOCALAPPDATA%\Temp (or %TEMP%) under Microsoft-update cover names (msedge_update, chrome_installer, dotnet_host, onedrive_setup, teams_update) and silently executes it via spawn(fp, [], { detached: true, stdio: 'ignore', windowsHide: true }) followed by ch.unref(). The download URL is XOR-decoded at runtime from opaque buffers carried in the foldmap dependency, with a fallback chain of https → curl.exe → bitsadmin to maximize delivery; TLS verification is disabled (rejectUnauthorized: false); the Mark-of-the-Web :Zone.Identifier ADS is stripped before execution. All sensitive identifiers in lib/worker.js (https, child_process, spawn, curl.exe, bitsadmin, powershell.exe, :Zone.Identifier, env vars, cover filenames) are constructed with String.fromCharCode(...) to evade signature scanning. The package's advertised index.js API (spawn/kill/list/has) is a decoy never referenced by the install path. Any developer or CI runner installing vortnode on Windows executes attacker-controlled code as the current user.

Source: ghsa-malware (760133192732842730eac928cc1132f28d87b8dd77e5f442d1e3b19bc993e114)

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.