AI Security Analysis: Carve Google Translate

Analysis generated: 2025-12-13T01:12:50+13:00
Model: gemini-3-pro-preview

Quick Facts

AI Analysis

Executive Summary

The "Carve Google Translate" VSCode extension presents a CRITICAL security risk to any environment where it is installed. The analysis detected over 1,800 high-severity malware indicators, including signatures associated with system command execution, file manipulation, and credential harvesting. Given the unverified status of the publisher and the presence of obfuscated code and post-installation scripts, this extension exhibits behavior consistent with a supply chain attack or a malicious trojan. Immediate removal is required.

Threat Assessment

The security posture of this extension is severely compromised. The findings indicate a high probability that the extension is acting as a vehicle for malicious activity rather than a simple translation tool.

• Malicious Post-Install Behavior: The most concerning aspect is the prevalence of postinstall_ YARA matches (e.g., postinstall_system_command, postinstall_network_communication). In the Node.js/VSCode ecosystem, "postinstall" scripts run automatically with the user's privileges immediately after the extension is downloaded. This is a common vector for malware to establish persistence or exfiltrate data before the user even uses the tool.
• Credential Harvesting: Findings 22 and 28 (credential_env_files) suggest the extension is scanning for or attempting to read .env files. A translation plugin has no legitimate business need to access environment variable files, which typically store API keys and database passwords.
• Obfuscation: Finding 26 (postinstall_obfuscation) indicates the presence of code designed to hide its true intent. Legitimate open-source extensions rarely use obfuscation; its presence usually signals an attempt to bypass security scanners.
• System Integrity Risk: Multiple findings regarding postinstall_file_manipulation and postinstall_crypto_operations suggest the extension may be attempting to modify local files or encrypt data (potentially ransomware-like behavior or simply encrypting exfiltrated data).

Risk Justification

Risk Score: 100.0/100 (CRITICAL)

This score is fully justified and potentially conservative.

1. Severity of Indicators: The findings are not merely bad coding practices; they are signatures of active malware behavior (RCE, Persistence, Exfiltration).
2. Attack Surface: VSCode extensions run with the same privileges as the developer. If this extension executes system commands, it has full access to the developer's source code, SSH keys, and internal network.
3. Publisher Trust: The publisher "jcyLite" is unverified and has a low user count, offering no reputation to counterbalance the technical findings.
4. Volume of Findings: 16,785 total findings is highly abnormal for a simple utility, suggesting the inclusion of a compromised dependency chain or a massive payload of malicious code.

Key Findings

• Arbitrary Code Execution (Findings 1, 2, 7, 12, 17, 21, 24, 25, 27, 30):
  • Indicator: postinstall_system_command
  • Analysis: The extension contains scripts configured to execute system-level commands immediately upon installation. This allows the attacker to run shell commands on the victim's machine.
• Credential Targeting (Findings 22, 28):
  • Indicator: credential_env_files
  • Analysis: The code specifically targets .env files, likely to scrape secrets and upload them to a remote server.
• Obfuscation (Finding 26):
  • Indicator: postinstall_obfuscation
  • Analysis: Code logic is deliberately obscured, preventing easy manual review and suggesting malicious intent.
• Unauthorized Network Activity (Findings 3, 11, 14, 16, 18, 19, 20):
  • Indicator: postinstall_network_communication
  • Analysis: While a translation tool needs network access, these indicators are tied to post-install scripts, suggesting the extension "phones home" immediately upon install, likely to register the infection or exfiltrate initial reconnaissance data.

Recommendations

1. Immediate Removal: Uninstall the extension from all VSCode instances immediately.
2. Credential Rotation: Because the extension shows capabilities of reading .env files, assume all secrets (API keys, database credentials, AWS keys) present on the machine during the time of infection are compromised. Rotate these credentials immediately.
3. Blocklist: Add the extension UUID (136de0e3-7b58-53a2-9ef9-3317a6ee7aab) to the organization's VSCode extension blocklist to prevent re-installation.
4. Incident Response: If this extension was installed on a machine with access to sensitive production environments, initiate an incident response process to check for lateral movement or unauthorized access logs.
5. System Scan: Run a full endpoint detection and response (EDR) scan on the affected machine to ensure no persistent backdoors (like reverse shells or scheduled tasks) were left behind by the post-install scripts.

Mitigation Strategies

There is no safe way to use this extension.

The risk is inherent to the code structure and the detected signatures.

• Alternative: Switch to a verified translation extension from a trusted publisher (e.g., Microsoft) or use browser-based translation tools outside the IDE.
• Strict Policy: If a translation tool is absolutely required within the IDE, ensure the replacement extension is audited and strictly limits network permissions to only the translation API endpoint.

Confidence Assessment

Confidence: 80%

• Supporting Factors: The convergence of multiple high-severity indicators (System Command + Obfuscation + Credential Access) creates a very strong pattern of malicious intent. It is highly unlikely that a legitimate developer would accidentally include all three of these specific behaviors in a translation tool.
• Caveats: The extremely high number of findings (16,000+) suggests the scan may be flagging a massive node_modules directory included in the package. Some of these could be false positives (e.g., a build tool inside node_modules might legitimately use system commands). However, the presence of credential_env_files and obfuscation alongside these commands makes the "benign false positive" scenario highly improbable.

Disclaimer

This analysis was generated by an AI model and should be reviewed by security professionals. The findings are based on automated security scanning and may include false positives. Always verify critical findings manually before taking action.