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My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

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11–20 of 194 posts

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#11
First time I've seen my https://github.com/simonw/claude-code-transcripts tool used to construct data that's embedded in a blog post, that's a neat way to use it. I usually share them as HTML pages in Gists instead, e.g. whttps://gisthost.github.io/?effbdc564939b88fe5c6299387e217da...

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#12
post #5

GitHub, npm, PyPi, and other package registries should consider exposing a firehose to allow people to do realtime security analysis of events. There are definitely scanners that would have caught this attack immediately, they just need a way to be informed of updates.

PyPI does exactly that, and it's been very effective. Security partners can scan packages and use the invite-only API to report them: https://blog.pypi.org/posts/2024-03-06-malware-reporting-evo...

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#13
post #8

Consider this your call to write native software. There is yet to be a supply chain attack on libc

Sure, but this is a pretty onerous restriction.

Do you think supply chain attacks will just get worse? I'm thinking that defensive measures will get better rapidly (especially after this hack)

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#14
post #8

Consider this your call to write native software. There is yet to be a supply chain attack on libc

This is presumably because libc just doesn't change very often (not meaning code changes, but release cadence). But the average native software stack does have lots of things that change relatively often[1]. So "native" vs. not is probably not a salient factor.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XZ_Utils_backdoor

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#15
post #7
post #2

Callum here, I was the developer that first discovered and reported the litellm vulnerability on Tuesday. I’m sharing the transcript of what it was like figuring out what was going on in real time, unedited with only minor redactions. I didn’t need to recount my thought process after the fact. It’s the very same ones I wrote down to help Claude figure out what was happening. I’m an ML engineer by trade, so having Cla…

Looks like we discovered it at essentially the same time, and in essentially the same way. If the pth file didn't trigger a fork-bomb like behavior, this might have stayed undiscoverd for quite a bit longer. Good thinking on asking Claude to walk you through on who to contact. I had no idea how to contact anyone related to PyPI, so I started by shooting an email to the maintainers and posting it on Hacker News. While…

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Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#16
post #7
post #2

Callum here, I was the developer that first discovered and reported the litellm vulnerability on Tuesday. I’m sharing the transcript of what it was like figuring out what was going on in real time, unedited with only minor redactions. I didn’t need to recount my thought process after the fact. It’s the very same ones I wrote down to help Claude figure out what was happening. I’m an ML engineer by trade, so having Cla…

Looks like we discovered it at essentially the same time, and in essentially the same way. If the pth file didn't trigger a fork-bomb like behavior, this might have stayed undiscoverd for quite a bit longer. Good thinking on asking Claude to walk you through on who to contact. I had no idea how to contact anyone related to PyPI, so I started by shooting an email to the maintainers and posting it on Hacker News. While…

> I had no idea how to contact anyone related to PyPI

https://pypi.org/security/:

> If you've identified a security issue with a project hosted on PyPI Login to your PyPI account, then visit the project's page on PyPI. At the bottom of the sidebar, click Report project as malware.

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#18
post #12
post #5

GitHub, npm, PyPi, and other package registries should consider exposing a firehose to allow people to do realtime security analysis of events. There are definitely scanners that would have caught this attack immediately, they just need a way to be informed of updates.

PyPI does exactly that, and it's been very effective. Security partners can scan packages and use the invite-only API to report them: https://blog.pypi.org/posts/2024-03-06-malware-reporting-evo...

PyPI is pretty best-in-class here and I think that they should be seen as the example for others to pursue.

The client side tooling needs work, but that's a major effort in and of itself.

Re: My minute-by-minute response to the LiteLLM malware attack

#20
post #11

First time I've seen my https://github.com/simonw/claude-code-transcripts tool used to construct data that's embedded in a blog post, that's a neat way to use it. I usually share them as HTML pages in Gists instead, e.g. w https://gisthost.github.io/?effbdc564939b88fe5c6299387e217da...

I’m a big proponent of it within our company! CC tried to style it to blend in with our blog but it was kind of a disaster. Definitely had a new appreciation for the out-of-the-box experience. I also tried to include the individual sub-pages of Claude investigating but it really trawled my whole machine looking for malware. Don’t know if you’ve thought of any systematic ways of redacting the endless pages of detailed logs?
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