OpenClaw AI Agent Skills Abused for Credential Exposure and Prompt-Injection Backdooring
Security researchers and media reports warned that the open-source AI agent OpenClaw (formerly Moltbot/Clawdbot) can be abused via its ClawHub “skills” ecosystem, with findings that ~7.1% of marketplace skills contributed to exposure of API keys, credentials, and credit card data due to problematic SKILL.md instructions. Snyk highlighted a particularly severe example, buy-anything skill v2.0.0, which performs credit-card “tokenization” in a way that can be used to pilfer financial details before prompting users to provide card information.
Additional research described indirect prompt-injection risk: a malicious Google document can coerce OpenClaw into integrating a new Telegram bot, enabling follow-on actions such as file exfiltration and deployment of a Sliver command-and-control beacon for persistence, with potential for privilege escalation, lateral movement, and ransomware execution. Separately, one report noted OpenClaw’s move to scan skills with VirusTotal, but also emphasized that signature-based scanning is not a complete mitigation for prompt-injection and other logic-level abuses; other items in the same news roundup (e.g., telecom “Salt Typhoon” oversight) were unrelated to OpenClaw’s vulnerabilities.
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Malicious OpenClaw skills abused via ClawHub to steal cryptocurrency and browser data
Security researchers reported that the *OpenClaw* self-hosted AI assistant ecosystem is being abused for malware distribution via **ClawHub**, a public registry for third-party “skills.” At least **14 malicious skills** uploaded over a short window masqueraded as crypto trading/wallet automation tools, but were designed to trick users into executing obfuscated setup commands that fetch and run remote scripts. Because OpenClaw skills are installed as executable code (not sandboxed) with access to local files and network resources, successful installs can enable credential theft and cryptocurrency wallet compromise on **Windows and macOS**, and one malicious listing reportedly reached prominent placement before removal, increasing the likelihood of accidental installs. Separate reporting also highlighted a related risk: a **1-click remote code execution (RCE)** issue affecting OpenClaw/Moltbot/ClawdBot was discussed in the security community, indicating that the same ecosystem is facing both supply-chain style extension abuse and potential direct exploitation paths. Organizations allowing developer or power-user adoption of OpenClaw should treat third-party skills as untrusted software, restrict installation sources, and monitor for social-engineering patterns such as “copy/paste this one-liner” installers that retrieve code from external servers—especially when tied to cryptocurrency-themed lures.
1 months ago
OpenClaw Ecosystem Targeted by Malicious ClawHub Skills and Infostealer Theft of Agent Configuration Files
A supply-chain poisoning campaign dubbed **ClawHavoc** compromised OpenClaw’s official *ClawHub* marketplace by distributing **1,184 trojanized “Skills”** intended to steal data and establish backdoor access on victim systems. Reporting attributes the initial disclosure to Koi Security, with Antiy CERT later tracking the activity as the **TrojanOpenClaw PolySkill** family and linking the uploads to **12 publisher accounts** (including one responsible for **677** packages). The attackers abused ClawHub’s permissive publishing model (any GitHub account older than one week could upload), mass-posting Skills disguised as crypto trading bots, productivity tools, and social utilities; analysis described behaviors including **ClickFix-style download prompts** and **reverse-shell droppers** enabling remote command execution and persistence. Separately, researchers reported infostealer activity exfiltrating sensitive files from victims’ local OpenClaw directories—`openclaw.json`, `device.json`, `soul.md`, and related memory files—highlighting how AI-agent artifacts can be leveraged beyond traditional credential theft. Hudson Rock assessed the malware as broadly harvesting files by extension rather than explicitly targeting OpenClaw, but warned dedicated modules are likely to emerge to decrypt/parse these agent files. The stolen data could enable attackers to connect to a victim’s local OpenClaw instance (notably if **port `18789`** is exposed) using `gateway.auth.token`, and potentially bypass “Safe Device” checks by abusing keys from `device.json` to sign messages as the victim’s paired device and access connected services.
3 weeks ago
OpenClaw AI Agent Marketplace Risks and VirusTotal Skill Scanning Integration
*OpenClaw*, an autonomous AI agent platform with a community “skills” marketplace, integrated **VirusTotal** scanning to check skills uploaded to *ClawHub* after security firms and researchers highlighted that the ecosystem is being abused to distribute malicious components. Reporting described attackers leveraging trust in marketplaces and “skills” registries to seed malware, and noted active discussion in criminal forums about using OpenClaw skills to support illicit activity (e.g., botnet operations). Separate research also pointed to rapid growth in lookalike packages (e.g., “claw” on npm/PyPI), reinforcing concerns that the surrounding supply chain is being targeted as the platform’s popularity increases. Enterprise risk assessments emphasized that many organizations are granting OpenClaw **privileged access** quickly (including via shadow deployments), creating high-impact failure modes if a host or skill is compromised—potentially exposing **API keys, OAuth tokens, and sensitive conversations**. OpenClaw acknowledged that VirusTotal-based scanning is **not sufficient** to detect non-signature threats such as prompt-injection-driven malicious behavior or skills that use natural language instructions to induce harmful actions, leaving material residual risk even with malware scanning in place.
1 months ago