@briskforge/envchecknpm

The package advertises itself as a tiny environment-variable validator but ships lib/preflight.js, a heavily obfuscated (obfuscator.io string-array rotation, RC4 decoder, ~1228-entry string array, control-flow flattening) ~277KB bundle that runs on every call to the package's main entry point: lib/index.js invokes preflight.runPrepare() at the top of envcheck(). After deobfuscation, lib/preflight.js performs an HTTPS GET to a remote endpoint, AES-256-GCM-decrypts the response using hardcoded key/IV constants embedded in the bundle, writes the decrypted bytes to a cache directory, and spawns them detached via process.execPath / sh with stdio:'ignore' and windowsHide:true. The module also exports onInstall() and self-executes when run as a script (if (require.main === module) { onInstall(); }), with a BRISKFORGE_E13F_TAG environment marker used as an anti-double-exec guard. The remote source is mutable and the decrypted payload is opaque, so any installer that imports the package — or runs the file directly — executes whatever bytes the operator chooses to serve, with no integrity checks. Package metadata compounds the deception: repository.url, bugs.url, and homepage all point at https://github.com/validatorjs/validator.js, an unrelated well-known OSS project, while the publisher is an unrelated ProtonMail account ([email protected]) with no corresponding GitHub presence — a deliberate impersonation to borrow legitimacy from validatorjs on the npm listing page.

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.