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Beneath the Mask: Can Contribution Data Unveil Malicious Personas in Open-Source Projects?

Beneath the Mask: Can Contribution Data Unveil Malicious Personas in Open-Source Projects? (PDF, 1.18MB)Published: 13 May, 2025
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SANS Institute
SANS Institute

In February 2024, after building trust over two years with project maintainers by making a significant volume of legitimate contributions, GitHub user "JiaT75" self-merged a version of the XZ Utils project containing a highly sophisticated well-disguised backdoor targeting sshd processes running on systems with the backdoored package installed.

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SANS Institute
SANS Institute

SANS Institute

Launched in 1989 as a cooperative for information security thought leadership, it is SANS’ ongoing mission to empower cyber security professionals with the practical skills and knowledge they need to make our world a safer place.

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