Which versions of cheaty-sync-bot are malicious?

The following npm versions of cheaty-sync-bot are flagged malicious: 1.0.0. Treat any of these as compromised.

How do I remediate cheaty-sync-bot if I installed it?

cheaty-sync-bot establishes remote access, so treat any host that installed it as fully compromised. Isolate the machine, remove the package, rotate all credentials it could reach, and rebuild from a trusted image rather than cleaning in place — a backdoor may have planted additional persistence.

I already installed cheaty-sync-bot — how do I know if it already compromised me?

If cheaty-sync-bot was installed, its post-install payload may already have run. Removing the package does not undo that — check outbound connections and credential use from the install window onward.

Is cheaty-sync-bot part of a known attack campaign?

Yes — cheaty-sync-bot is associated with the IN-MAL-2026-003204 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 cheaty-sync-bot across my projects, lockfiles, and CI pipelines?

Search your lockfiles and build artifacts for cheaty-sync-bot (version 1.0.0).

Malicious package

cheaty-sync-botnpm

Advisory published May 19, 2026Updated May 26, 2026

cheaty-sync-bot is a confirmed malicious npm package (MAL-2026-4518) that opens a backdoor for remote access (malicious version 1.0.0). Do not install it — remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.

Malicious code in cheaty-sync-bot (npm)

MAL-2026-4518

Immediate action

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

npm uninstall cheaty-sync-bot

What this malware does

cheaty-sync-bot ships a clipboard-sync CLI that hardcodes a single Telegram bot token (index.js:10) owned by the package author. There is no configuration path for installers to supply their own bot — every user of this tool connects to the same author-controlled relay. Two concrete harms result: (1) Silent-relay: clipboard contents (text and images) and installer chat identifiers flow through the author's Telegram bot, giving the author visibility into every installer's session via getUpdates polling. (2) Backdoor / remote code execution: incoming Telegram messages are interpolated into a PowerShell command (powershell -Command "Set-Clipboard -Value \"${escapedText}\"") at index.js:31-34 and passed to exec(). The escaping only replaces double quotes with backtick-quotes; PowerShell metacharacters such as backticks, $(...) subexpressions, and newlines are not sanitized, so anyone holding the bot token (the author, or anyone who obtains it) can send a crafted message to any installer running the CLI and achieve arbitrary command execution on the Windows host.

Malicious versions

1 flagged

1.0.0

Indicators of compromise (SHA-256)

45b192c71c59ccca1d9cc720372bd29f39eae8b5da4d572cd1e8312d6b57d6b4

Detection & response playbook

Backdoor / remote access

Find it
Search your lockfiles and build artifacts for cheaty-sync-bot (version 1.0.0).
If you installed it — respond
cheaty-sync-bot establishes remote access, so treat any host that installed it as fully compromised. Isolate the machine, remove the package, rotate all credentials it could reach, and rebuild from a trusted image rather than cleaning in place — a backdoor may have planted additional persistence.
Did it already run?
If cheaty-sync-bot was installed, its post-install payload may already have run. Removing the package does not undo that — check outbound connections and credential use from the install window onward.

Frequently asked questions

No. cheaty-sync-bot on npm has been identified as a malicious package (version 1.0.0 flagged). It should be removed immediately — do not install or keep it in your dependency tree.

Campaign

IN-MAL-2026-003204

References

npmjs.com

Credits

Amazon Inspector · finder

Detect & block this

O3 blocks cheaty-sync-bot-class packages before install and in CI — and if it already ran, its runtime egress monitoring catches the C2 callback and severs the channel.

Malware detection Runtime egress monitoring

Explore

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