chai-foundrynpm
chai-foundry is a confirmed malicious npm package (MAL-2026-13356) that steals credentials and exfiltrates sensitive data (malicious versions 7.0.2, 7.0.3). Do not install it — remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.
Malicious code in chai-foundry (npm)
What this malware does
[email protected] is a trojan package presenting itself as a chai plugin (README shows chai.use(chaiLeaf)) while its badges, documentation, and internal version metadata (lib/meta.js exports version 9.6.0) are copied from the pino logger. The package's main entry index.js immediately loads ./lib/config, a 3.5MB file that is heavily obfuscated with obfuscator.io-class transforms: a rotated string array of 20,855 entries, two runtime decoder functions, tens of thousands of decoder-wrapper indirections, and control-flow flattening (104,934 deobfuscation changes reported by webcrack). The file begins with a top-level IIFE, so its opaque body runs automatically the moment any consumer calls require('chai-foundry'). All destinations and string constants are reconstructed at runtime, so the payload's network endpoints and behaviors are hidden from static inspection. The combination of identity impersonation, mismatched metadata, and a multi-megabyte control-flow-flattened import-time loader in a package advertised as a small chai plugin is the canonical shape of a hostile npm dropper/stealer.
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.
Malicious versions
Indicators of compromise (SHA-256)
Detection & response playbook
Credential / info stealerFind it
Scan your lockfiles (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, yarn.lock, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, etc.) and build artifacts for chai-foundry (2 malicious versions). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging chai-foundry across your stack and pipelines.
If you installed it — respond
chai-foundry 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-foundry 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-foundry 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
Campaign
References
Credits
- Amazon Inspector · finder
- ReversingLabs · finder
Detect & block this
O3 blocks chai-foundry-class packages before install and in CI — and if it already ran, its runtime egress monitoring catches the credential exfiltration and severs the channel.