Which versions of hardhat-lock are malicious?

The following npm versions of hardhat-lock are flagged malicious: 2.21.0. Treat any of these as compromised.

How do I remediate hardhat-lock if I installed it?

hardhat-lock 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 hardhat-lock — how do I know if it already compromised me?

If hardhat-lock 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 hardhat-lock part of a known attack campaign?

Yes — hardhat-lock is associated with the IN-MAL-2026-020620 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 hardhat-lock 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 hardhat-lock (version 2.21.0). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging hardhat-lock across your stack and pipelines.

Malicious package

hardhat-locknpm

hardhat-lock is a confirmed malicious npm package (MAL-2026-17233) that steals credentials and exfiltrates sensitive data (malicious version 2.21.0). Do not install it — remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.

Malicious code in hardhat-lock (npm)

MAL-2026-17233

Immediate action

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

npm uninstall hardhat-lock

What this malware does

The npm package [email protected] publishes itself as a logger/middleware but its identity and contents are inconsistent with that purpose: README badges, LICENSE, index.d.ts and docs/* are copied from the unrelated pino project (maintained by pinojs), while the package name squats the Ethereum-tooling keyword 'hardhat'. index.js unconditionally executes require('./lib/config') at module load, and lib/config.js is a ~4MB obfuscator.io-style single-line file (rotated string array of 23,981 entries, hex-escaped tokens, numeric wrapper decoders mt/mw/M0..M5/K/R/s/G, control-flow flattening, and 40,131 inline decoder replacements confirmed by webcrack) whose top-level IIFE runs the moment any downstream code does require('hardhat-lock'). The combination — impersonation of an established package under a different scope-adjacent name, opaque multi-megabyte obfuscated blob with no plausible logging use, and guaranteed import-time execution — is a supply-chain payload carrier: installing and loading the package places attacker-controlled code inside the consumer's Node.js process with unrestricted access to environment variables, filesystem, and network.

Malicious versions

1 flagged

2.21.0

Indicators of compromise (SHA-256)

035a099bd6a60e41f1e1cbc1b70f27fecb9bef3f12d54e016d6991b581fc880f

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 hardhat-lock (version 2.21.0). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging hardhat-lock across your stack and pipelines.
If you installed it — respond
hardhat-lock 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 hardhat-lock 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 hardhat-lock 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. hardhat-lock on npm has been identified as a malicious package (version 2.21.0 flagged). It should be removed immediately — do not install or keep it in your dependency tree.

Campaign

IN-MAL-2026-020620

References

npmjs.com

Credits

Amazon Inspector · finder

Detect & block this

O3 blocks hardhat-lock-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

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