Researchers at Socket uncovered a network of 222 GitHub repositories, tracked as Operation Muck and Load, built to spread Windows malware through a fake Go module posing as a DNS and subdomain scanner. Running the module quietly launches PowerShell that pulls an encrypted payload from attacker infrastructure and deploys infostealers, remote access trojans, and cryptominers. To look trustworthy, the operators used an automated workflow that force-pushes fake commits every minute, making repositories appear actively maintained and generating hundreds of package versions. More than 700 of the module's 1,200-plus versions were malicious. The lures cluster around crypto wallets, Telegram bots, and game cheats, aimed at people likely to run untrusted code.
Socket detailed PolinRider, an active North Korean supply-chain campaign that has planted 108 malicious packages and a browser extension across the npm, Go, and Packagist ecosystems, expanding the developer-targeting activity behind this week's Rollup npm packages. Operators take over legitimate GitHub maintainer accounts, often via expired-domain or account-recovery abuse, then bulk-modify repositories and publish infected versions. To stay hidden, they rewrite Git history so malicious commits look old, pad one-line loaders with whitespace to push them off screen, and disguise payloads as font files. Some trigger automatically through VS Code task settings when a developer simply opens the project folder in an editor like VS Code or Cursor.
Socket reports a new wave of the self-spreading Shai-Hulud supply-chain worm, in its Miasma and Hades variants, that compromised more npm packages and, for the first time, reached the Go ecosystem. On June 24 attackers used a hijacked maintainer account to push trojanized versions of LeoPlatform and RStreams npm packages, tied to cloud and serverless workloads, and also poisoned a Go module from the Verana blockchain project. The malware harvests developer and CI/CD credentials, abuses GitHub Actions, and polls GitHub hourly for a marker commit to pull down its Hades payload. Researchers note the campaign keeps shifting ecosystems and indicators to stay ahead of detection rather than changing its core behavior.
TrustStrike Labs