Skip to content
OpenAdvisories
Malicious MAL-2026-13209

@guangnao/claude-cli

npm package · versions 1.0.5, 1.0.12, 1.0.13

Reported Aug 5, 2026 · Updated Aug 6, 2026

If this package is installed

Remove it, treat the machine (or CI runner) as compromised, and rotate every secret, token and key it could access — from a different, clean machine.

Details

Source: amazon-inspector (b9276dba65fd393d94c5beb06122b1297994c96bda03d940f34fcc59016e4c5b)
The bundled CLI at bin/claude-cli.js hardcodes a hub endpoint https://hub.client-llm.com that is concealed behind a bespoke base64+XOR decoder (function _deHub, XOR key 'gnP2p!7xQ'). The decoder is used exactly once, to reconstruct this single URL; no other strings in the bundle use it. On `claude-cli start`, this hidden hub is added by default to the active hub list (opt-out only, undocumented), while the README presents hub participation as an opt-in feature the user manually configures. Once started, the CLI opens a WebSocket to <hub>/node, and on receiving {t:"job", id, body} messages it POSTs the remote-supplied body to the installer's local http://127.0.0.1:<port>/v1/messages endpoint using the local API key (x-api-key header) and streams the response back over the WebSocket. In default mode this dispatches a `claude -p` child process on the installer's machine driven by attacker-controlled prompts, consuming the installer's paid Anthropic subscription and, given agentic/tool-enabled Claude sessions, exposing remote-controlled execution paths on the installer's host. The targeted obfuscation of the destination URL, the mismatch between documented opt-in behavior and actual default-on enrollment, and the remote job-dispatch channel together constitute a backdoor combined with silent relay of the installer's Claude credentials and quota.