Malicious code in @marketfront/navbar (npm)
The @marketfront/navbar package is part of a 25-package malicious campaign batch-published to the @marketfront npm scope by npm user 'marketfront' ([email protected]) within a roughly 3-minute window on 2026-07-01. All packages in the campaign were published at version 7.0.0 and use e-commerce/marketing frontend component names as cover.
The package declares a postinstall hook (node scripts/postinstall.js) that executes heavily obfuscated (obfuscator.io-style) code automatically at npm install time. Static analysis of the decoded payload revealed a credential harvester that dynamically requires fs, os, http, https, zlib, path and dns, then reads approximately 20 sensitive credential files including ~/.ssh, ~/.aws/credentials, ~/.kube/config, ~/.docker/config.json, ~/.npmrc, ~/.netrc, ~/.pgpass, ~/.git-credentials, ~/.env and ~/.bash_history. Collected data is exfiltrated via a gzip-compressed HTTPS POST with a custom X-Secret header to the path /api/v1/events, alongside a DNS resolver beacon. The command-and-control host is concealed behind an additional RC4+XOR encryption layer around an embedded configuration blob and was not statically resolved.
The decoded behavioral payload (module requires, credential-file target list, exfiltration headers and endpoint) is byte-for-byte identical across sampled packages in the campaign. The campaign shares tooling and infrastructure patterns (obfuscated postinstall credential harvester, X-Secret header, /api/v1/events exfiltration path, RC4-concealed C2) with the earlier @emcd-vue campaign, indicating the same actor rotating scopes and disposable maintainer emails.
Source: amazon-inspector
The package registers scripts/postinstall.js as an npm postinstall hook. The script is heavily obfuscated (obfuscator.io-style string-array with RC4 decoder, hex-named functions, runtime string decoding) and, on npm install, harvests a full profile of the installing machine: os.hostname(), os.userInfo().username, os.homedir(), os.platform(), os.arch(), os.networkInterfaces(), process.argv0, process.cwd(), the complete process.env, npm_config_user_agent, and Windows-specific USERDOMAIN, COMPUTERNAME, APPDATA, LOCALAPPDATA, TEMP, and PROGRAMDATA, along with the package name and version. The collected data is JSON-serialized, zlib-compressed, XOR-encrypted, and exfiltrated over two channels to a runtime-decoded remote host: an HTTPS POST and a DNS TXT tunnel that chunks the payload into subdomain labels via a custom dns.Resolver with attacker-specified servers. Payload execution is gated by anti-analysis checks — inspection of process.argv and NODE_OPTIONS for 'node_modules' / '.npm' tokens, a Date.now() timing threshold, and a global sentinel for single execution — designed to fire on real developer and CI installs while staying silent under scanners. The package presents itself as an 'Internal structured logger' under the name @marketfront/navbar, but has no working library surface: dist/index.js re-exports../src/index.js, which is not shipped in the tarball. The entire functional behavior is the install-time stealer. Developer and CI process environments routinely contain cloud provider tokens, npm publish tokens, registry credentials, and CI secrets, so the impact is credential compromise of the installer's account/infrastructure.
