procwirePyPI
Malicious code in procwire (PyPI) Remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.
What this malware does
setup.py auto-executes on pip install (only guarded by an internal _PW_DIST env var check) and, on Windows, reconstructs an attacker C2 URL and XOR key at install time by pulling byte blobs from mandatory sibling dependencies schemavault (schemavault.registry._k, _ep, _p) and bytekit (bytekit.xor). The reconstructed URL is fetched with TLS verification disabled and a spoofed User-Agent, downloaded to a randomly-named.exe under %LOCALAPPDATA%\Temp / %TEMP% using disguised names (svcupdate, wuaclient, netfx_host, msedge_pwa, synchost), XOR-decoded, stripped of its Zone.Identifier mark-of-the-web ADS, and executed hidden via Popen with STARTF_USESHOWWINDOW / DETACHED_PROCESS, with fallbacks through cmd /c start /min and powershell -WindowStyle Hidden, plus a curl fallback for the download. The runtime module procwire/bridge.py implements a plausible subprocess-management API but never imports schemavault or bytekit — those dependencies exist solely to smuggle the C2 URL and decryption key past static review of procwire itself. Author metadata (Dmitri Petrov <[email protected]>) is consistent with a throwaway publisher identity. Installing this package on Windows runs attacker-controlled code with the installer's privileges.
The campaign consists of multiple packages. The trigger sits in the package 'procwire,' which depends on two others. During installation, procwire uses schemavault and bytekit packages. The first one holds the URL holding malware (in two places, once as steganography in the bundled image and once as a fallback just as a list of encoded bytes). The bytekit implements simple custom decoding used to retrieve back the URL in the fallback method. Additionally, procwire is also a dependency of confighub, turning another package into malware. The downloaded executable is run and quickly removed. The executable likely contains an infostealer and contacts the domain 030502[.]xyz
Category: MALICIOUS - The campaign has clearly malicious intent, like infostealers.
Campaign: 2026-07-procwire
Reasons (based on the campaign):
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The package overrides the install command in setup.py to execute malicious code during installation.
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Downloads and executes a remote executable.
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obfuscation
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The malicious code is intentionally included in a dependency of the package
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malware
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steganography
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 procwire (4 malicious versions). O3 Security's supply-chain scanner checks every dependency against known-malicious package intelligence at install time and in CI, flagging procwire across your stack and pipelines.
If you installed it — respond
procwire 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 procwire 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 procwire 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
- Kamil Mańkowski (kam193) · analyst
Detect & block this
O3 blocks procwire-class packages before install and in CI — and if it already ran, its runtime egress monitoring catches the credential exfiltration and severs the channel.