A malicious campaign is targeting job seekers in the Web3 space by impersonating a legitimate development team and using a fake interview process to deliver malware. The attackers, operating under the guise of a Ukrainian Web3 company, lure potential employees with a seemingly standard technical assessment that requires them to clone and run a malicious GitHub repository. The project, named “UltraX,” contains a weaponized NPM dependency that, once installed, initiates a multi-stage attack to steal sensitive data, including cryptocurrency wallets and personal information.
The attackers’ strategy relies heavily on social engineering, preying on the trust and eagerness of job candidates. By presenting the malicious code as part of a routine technical challenge, they bypass typical security awareness and trick victims into voluntarily executing the payload. The campaign was brought to light when a community member grew suspicious and alerted SlowMist researchers, who confirmed the presence of a backdoor within the project’s dependencies. This discovery highlights the growing threat of supply chain attacks that exploit developer tools and workflows.
The malicious NPM package, initially identified as “redux-ace@1.0.3,” was later replaced with “rtk-logger@1.11.5” after the original was removed by NPM’s security team. This quick adaptation by the attackers, including the use of heavily obfuscated code in the newer package, demonstrates their sophistication and persistence in evading detection. The attack’s success hinges on the victim’s trust in the provided repository and the inherent expectation that a technical interview project would be benign.
The threat extends beyond the initial victims, as researchers found that the malicious repository had been forked by other GitHub accounts. This suggests a wider, coordinated effort to spread the malware and target a broader range of job seekers in the Web3 market.
The forked repositories act as additional entry points for the same attack, increasing the potential reach and impact of the campaign. This indicates a well-organized operation with a clear goal of compromising multiple targets.
The infection mechanism is particularly insidious because it leverages a standard developer workflow. When a victim runs “npm install” to set up the project, the malicious package is automatically triggered. The code then executes a sophisticated, multi-stage process to harvest sensitive data from the user’s system, including browser data and cryptocurrency wallet files.
This method of delivery makes it difficult for traditional security measures to block the attack, as the malicious code is introduced via a trusted and expected process.
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