Checkmarx: GitHub repos breached via Trivy-campaign credentials, malicious KICS/AST Actions, Docker image and IDE/Jenkins plugins published (no CVE)
Severity: high · Patch status: patched · Since 2026-03-23
Checkmarx says its GitHub repositories were accessed on 2026-03-19 in a way it links to the Trivy compromise by the actor tracked as TeamPCP, and on 2026-03-23 attackers published malicious Open VSX plugins (ast-results 2.53.0, cx-dev-assist 1.7.0) and malicious checkmarx/ast-github-action and checkmarx/kics-github-action builds that ran a credential stealer (Sysdig: same tpcp.tar.gz archive format and RSA/AES encryption as the Trivy wave, exfiltrating to a newly registered lookalike domain). Checkmarx reports that a second wave on 2026-04-22 pushed a malicious KICS Docker Hub image (tags latest, alpine, debian, v2.1.20, v2.1.21 and debian variants), a malicious ast-github-action tag, and malicious VS Code extension versions, and that a modified Jenkins AST plugin followed on 2026-05-09. Data exfiltrated from its GitHub repositories on 2026-03-30 was published on the dark web on 2026-04-25; Checkmarx says it came from GitHub, not customer production, and Mandiant found no access to the Checkmarx One SaaS or AWS production environments. Anyone who ran the affected actions, images or plugins in the listed windows should treat the secrets visible to that runner or workstation as exposed. Checkmarx removed the artifacts, rotated credentials, revoked classic PATs and moved to OIDC, and declared the incident contained on 2026-07-06. Same campaign as the Trivy record (aquasecurity-trivy-cve-2026-33634), a separate victim.
What to do
- Search workflow run logs and Docker pull history for checkmarx/ast-github-action, checkmarx/kics-github-action and the checkmarx/kics image from 2026-03-23 12:58-16:50 UTC and 2026-04-22; treat any secret available to those runs as compromised and rotate it.
- Search GitHub orgs for repositories named tpcp-docs and for outbound requests to checkmarx[.]zone (Sysdig IOCs), then rotate GitHub PATs and cloud credentials used by affected runners.
- Check developer machines for Checkmarx extensions ast-results 2.53.0 / 2.63 / 2.66 and cx-dev-assist 1.7.0 / 1.17 / 1.19 and reinstall from the official marketplace at the versions Checkmarx lists.
- If you run the Jenkins AST plugin, confirm it is not version 2026.5.09 (published 2026-05-09) and move to a version Checkmarx lists as clean.
- Pin third-party actions to full commit SHAs instead of tags and pin container images by digest.
Fixed versions
- ast-results 2.67.0
- cx-dev-assist 1.18.0
- Jenkins AST plugin 2.0.13-848.v76e89de8a_053 or 2.0.13-847.v08c0072b_2fd5
Sources
All live incidents on Threat Watch
