Which versions of chai-as-smart are malicious?

The following npm versions of chai-as-smart are flagged malicious: 2.3.5. Treat any of these as compromised.

How do I remediate chai-as-smart if I installed it?

chai-as-smart is built to steal secrets, so assume every credential the build or runtime could read is compromised. Remove it from your project and lockfile, then rotate ALL exposed secrets — npm/registry tokens, cloud keys, CI/CD secrets, SSH keys, and any .env values — from a known-clean machine. Audit logs for unauthorized use of those credentials.

I already installed chai-as-smart — how do I know if it already compromised me?

If chai-as-smart was ever installed, its post-install/runtime payload may have already executed. O3's L7 egress monitoring and runtime eBPF sensors detect the credential exfiltration or command-and-control callback after install and block the malicious outbound channel, so you catch and contain the actual compromise — not just the presence of the package.

Is chai-as-smart part of a known attack campaign?

Yes — chai-as-smart is associated with the IN-MAL-2026-009099 campaign. Packages in the same campaign often share infrastructure and payloads, so check whether any related packages are also in your dependency tree.

How do I find chai-as-smart across my projects, lockfiles, and CI pipelines?

Scan your lockfiles (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, yarn.lock, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, etc.) and build artifacts for chai-as-smart (version 2.3.5). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging chai-as-smart across your stack and pipelines.

Malicious package

chai-as-smartnpm

Malicious code in chai-as-smart (npm) Remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.

MAL-2026-10046

Immediate action

Remove the package, then rotate any secrets the build/runtime could reach.

npm uninstall chai-as-smart

What this malware does

On require, index.js spawns lib/initializeCaller.js as a detached background process. That script decodes a base64-hidden URL (https://ipcheck-hashed.vercel.app/api/auth/6c1d60d35852ef0c05df), POSTs the caller's full process.env to that endpoint via axios, and then passes the HTTP response body into new Function('require', response.data) and immediately invokes it with the real require, giving the remote server arbitrary code execution inside the installer's Node.js process. The C2 URL and headers are stored as base64 inside fake object literals labeled DEV_API_KEY/DEV_SECRET_KEY, and the package name and package.json keywords (fast, logger, stream, json) masquerade as a pino-style logger middleware to lure installers into requiring it. The combined behavior — environment-variable exfiltration to a hardcoded attacker endpoint plus remote-fetched code execution with full require access — compromises any machine that installs or imports this package, exposing tokens, cloud credentials, and CI secrets and enabling full follow-on RCE.

Malicious versions

1 flagged

2.3.5

Indicators of compromise (SHA-256)

bbeb8dc929ba80789f3386d489e22fc4efa5fa43b2901a4d6aa8524c03168a58

Detection & response playbook

Credential / info stealer

Find it
Scan your lockfiles (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, yarn.lock, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, etc.) and build artifacts for chai-as-smart (version 2.3.5). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging chai-as-smart across your stack and pipelines.
If you installed it — respond
chai-as-smart is built to steal secrets, so assume every credential the build or runtime could read is compromised. Remove it from your project and lockfile, then rotate ALL exposed secrets — npm/registry tokens, cloud keys, CI/CD secrets, SSH keys, and any .env values — from a known-clean machine. Audit logs for unauthorized use of those credentials.
Did it already run?
If chai-as-smart was ever installed, its post-install/runtime payload may have already executed. O3's L7 egress monitoring and runtime eBPF sensors detect the credential exfiltration or command-and-control callback after install and block the malicious outbound channel, so you catch and contain the actual compromise — not just the presence of the package.
How O3 protects you
O3 blocks chai-as-smart before install through its supply-chain scanner, and if it has already run, detects and severs the exfiltration or C2 callback at runtime through L7 egress monitoring and eBPF.

Frequently asked questions

No. chai-as-smart on npm has been identified as a malicious package (version 2.3.5 flagged). It should be removed immediately — do not install or keep it in your dependency tree.

Campaign

IN-MAL-2026-009099

References

npmjs.com

Credits

Amazon Inspector · finder

Detect & block this

O3 blocks chai-as-smart-class packages before install and in CI — and if it already ran, its runtime egress monitoring catches the credential exfiltration and severs the channel.

Malware detection Runtime egress monitoring