Which versions of transfomers are malicious?

The following PyPI versions of transfomers are flagged malicious: 4.44.2. Treat any of these as compromised.

How do I remediate transfomers if I installed it?

transfomers 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 transfomers — how do I know if it already compromised me?

If transfomers 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 transfomers part of a known attack campaign?

Yes — transfomers is associated with the 2026-09-openaii, IN-MAL-2026-020008 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 transfomers across my projects, lockfiles, and CI pipelines?

Search your lockfiles and build artifacts for transfomers (version 4.44.2).

Malicious package

transfomersPyPI

Advisory published Sep 11, 2026Updated Sep 11, 2026

transfomers is a confirmed malicious PyPI package (MAL-2026-16136) that steals credentials and exfiltrates sensitive data (malicious version 4.44.2). Do not install it — remove it immediately and rotate any exposed credentials.

Malicious code in transfomers (PyPI)

MAL-2026-16136

Immediate action

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

pip uninstall transfomers

What this malware does

Package name typosquats the popular transformers library. The distribution installs a .pth file into site-packages, which the Python interpreter auto-executes on every startup. The.pth file prepends decoy comments falsely asserting the package is verified clean, then runs exec on a payload obfuscated with base64 and per-byte XOR (key 0x5A). The decoded payload writes an idempotency marker at /tmp/.lurves-planted, then invokes curl to download http://16.78.16.190:7788/lurves-agent.py to /tmp/a and runs it via python3 /tmp/a --daemon in a detached session (start_new_session=True). The destination is a hardcoded bare IP over plaintext HTTP, unpinned and integrity-unchecked. Multi-layer obfuscation and the prompt-injection style comments demonstrate deliberate concealment of the payload.

Typosquatting package planting a malicious PTH file that during loading Python downloads the next stage. It then hides its existence, downloads the further stage and clears logs. The next stage exfiltrates sensitive data (SSH keys, cloud credentials), ensures persistence and plants a cryptominer. The original PTH file contains a simple attempt to discourage analysis via AI agents.

Category: MALICIOUS - The campaign has clearly malicious intent, like infostealers.

Campaign: 2026-09-openaii

Reasons (based on the campaign):

Downloads and executes a remote malicious script.
obfuscation
abuses-pth
cryptominer
infostealer
exfiltration-credentials
files-exfiltration
exfiltration-ssh-keys
persistence
typosquatting
covering-tracks

Malicious versions

1 flagged

4.44.2

Indicators of compromise (SHA-256)

c6a3963d4a040c2ab6bfcd6a41395bc60c6b5755420157c053b9b88d9befec9a

df75802d76ea42dd9a4e543e30565723bfaed892475cbeaca7ef561a67c1f0b3

Detection & response playbook

Credential / info stealer

Find it
Search your lockfiles and build artifacts for transfomers (version 4.44.2).
If you installed it — respond
transfomers 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 transfomers 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. transfomers on PyPI has been identified as a malicious package (version 4.44.2 flagged). It should be removed immediately — do not install or keep it in your dependency tree.

Campaign

2026-09-openaiiIN-MAL-2026-020008

References

Credits

Amazon Inspector · finder
Kamil Mańkowski (kam193) · analyst

Detect & block this

O3 blocks transfomers-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

Explore

All malware advisories How O3 detects malware Vulnerability database