this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2026

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344

400+ Arch Linux AUR Packages Compromised in a Supply Chain Attack Deploying Infostealers (cybersecuritynews.com)

submitted 3 weeks ago by rafssunny@lemmy.zip to c/technology@lemmy.world

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[–] Tetsuo@jlai.lu 71 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I hope all the Arch based distros will do a proper post to inform their users on how to cleanup afterwards.

I'm hoping at least cachyos, the distro I use, will tell me exactly how to check and clean my system.

I remember that when I installed a few of my AUR package, I was well aware that this repo was pretty much unregulated and that I just have to trust it's safe. So I made sure to only use AUR as a last resort. But there was warnings on cachyos that were displayed to tell me to be cautious about it so that's at least a positive.

[–] yesman@lemmy.world 62 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

The article has instructions to do exactly that.

Users who regularly install AUR packages should take the following steps immediately:

Run pacman -Qm to list all foreign (AUR) packages installed on your system and cross-reference against the published list of compromised packages

Audit recent PKGBUILD history for any packages installed between June 10–12, 2026

Rotate all credentials — browser passwords, SSH keys, API tokens, and cloud access keys — if any flagged package was installed

Scan for suspicious processes masquerading as kernel threads using tools like rkhunter or chkrootkit

Consider using AUR helpers with PKGBUILD review prompts enabled by default.

The Checklist of infected packages

[–] Tetsuo@jlai.lu 25 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (19 children)

Ok, but I was expecting something a bit more automated then opening a list of package in kate and comparing it to my list of installed AUR package... Plus it's 400 package so that's a lot of things to check and plenty of space to miss one package by manually checking.

But I get it I'm lazy and just need to script something myself. This is affecting so many people I thought we would have a script to check quickly if you are "infected".

Edit : thanks for the numerous script sent as reply ! But I'm all set now, thanks !

[–] bigbangdangler@reddthat.com 23 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

It took Arch ~19 years just to get archinstall.

Something tells me there won't be a script.

[–] daggermoon@piefed.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

The link is a script

[–] esc@piefed.social 4 points 3 weeks ago

Arch had curses based installator for a long time, it became unmaintained.

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[–] CaptDust@sh.itjust.works 15 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

CachyOS community seems to have a detection script, I have not vetted this run at your own discretion.

https://discuss.cachyos.org/t/aur-compromised-400-packages-affected-20260611/31040

[–] yaroto98@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Here's a script:

https://gist.github.com/Kidev/59bf9f5fb53ab5eee99f19a6a2fc3992

[–] 0x0@infosec.pub 5 points 3 weeks ago

You could probably find it on aur lmao

[–] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 4 points 3 weeks ago

It's at the bottom of the doc:

echo "Checking for infected AUR packages (${#INFECTED_PKGS[@]} total)..."
echo

found=()
for pkg in "${INFECTED_PKGS[@]}"; do
    if pacman -Qi "$pkg" &>/dev/null; then
        found+=("$pkg")
    fi
done

if [[ ${#found[@]} -eq 0 ]]; then
    echo "Clean: none of the known infected packages are installed."
else
    echo "WARNING: ${#found[@]} infected package(s) found:"
    for pkg in "${found[@]}"; do
        echo "  - $pkg"
    done
fi

Not sure why it uses -Qi instead of -Qm since there's no point in scanning pacman packages, but I'm no expert

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[–] gemakey@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago (6 children)

Holy shit it's like all of Python.

[–] Eldritch@piefed.world 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah, Python has been a massive vulnerability for a long while. And the AUR has similar issues. This is only getting widespread coverage now. But it's always been a risk.

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[–] misterrabbit@lemmy.world 30 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

Been saying for years that people need to stop treating the AUR like a repo, when it's more akin to curl installscript.sh | bash.

[–] goatinspace@feddit.org 11 points 3 weeks ago

Some packages pull files from personal dropbox...

[–] HaraldvonBlauzahn@feddit.org 7 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

So, better to use a safe language, and use

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs/ | sh

(I copied that from https://rust-lang.org/tools/install/ just a second ago....)

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[–] Cease@mander.xyz 16 points 3 weeks ago (8 children)

I think a lot of people are confusing what the AUR actually IS. It is NOT the official package repository used by Archlinux - it's more like a bunch of community install scripts for stuff that isn't officially supported yet - for popularity or other reasons.

So for all those people complaining and saying "debian does it better" it's very likely that you would not even HAVE a package to install and would have to come up with a build script on your own - the AUR allows you to skip this and instead just verify that the script itself isn't malicious, which is usually fairly obvious.

A lot of people here seem to be under the impression that all of this effort should be abstracted for them - but that's what you chose when you left windows - a system that you control intimately with a necessitation to actually do some upkeep yourself because a giant company isn't doing it for you.

In other words. RTFM and stop expecting other people fix all your problems for you, because that's exactly how windows got to how it currently is.

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[–] lazylemons@lemmy.today 15 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I have always been nervous about this type of thing happening with the AUR. Thankfully many packages I used to need the AUR for have since added native versions or made flatpaks. I hope AUR users don't have too many issues from this!

[–] Holytimes@sh.itjust.works 9 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

flatpaks arn't any safer and with how poor the sandbox is handled by 99% of devs. Hell flatpaks have a new issue every other month. Its almost more often to see a new flatpak problem then aur problem.

Its literally no safer in reality sure on paper its safer but reality has proven that flatpaks just are not some magical fix to this problem.

Hell half the time when flatpaks do have issues they go unaddressed or fixed for months after they are found. While AUR problems get smacked real fucking fast after they are found.

[–] Eldritch@piefed.world 5 points 3 weeks ago

The one positive with flatpak is that it allows for universal deployment. A lot of projects are providing official builds. But you are still relying on them to vet what they put in.

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[–] Lord743@lemmy.world 10 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

1500+ now https://md.archlinux.org/s/SxbqukK6IA

[–] KssioAug@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

I was starting to get too confident in AUR. Thankfully I wasn't affected. Just replaced all possible AUR packages to their respective Arch and Flatpak alternatives, with exception of very few or from the ones I had no option. But will definitely check before updating them, and will only install AUR packages as a last resort.

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[–] malloc@lemmy.world 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

Is this the first time AUR has been compromised to this degree?

Given how changes are often unvetted, I am surprised this hasn’t occurred before.

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[–] xthexder@l.sw0.com 6 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Not even having npm installed as a system package feels like a personal win right now. I'd like to think I would have caught this due to the number of dependencies it would introduce to my system. node_modules seems like it's been the source of most of the recent CVEs I'm hearing about.

[–] fxdave@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I develop inside docker for this reason too

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[–] xploit@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago

Welp if nothing else at least this has helped me to replace jack1 with jack1 (out of my 4 total Aur packages)

[–] BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

Expecting user to inspect install scripts is retarded. And this is the result.

[–] GameEngineer@infosec.pub 5 points 3 weeks ago (11 children)

So what would the alternative be? If the resources or desire don't exist to make a package official, how else would you install it?

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[–] Kazel@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 3 weeks ago

Then dont use arch and the aur easy as that

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