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Python Pickle Malware Scanner

PyPI Test

Security scanner detecting Python Pickle files performing suspicious actions.

For more generic model scanning, Protect AI's modelscan is now available to scan not only Pickle files but also PyTorch, TensorFlow, and Keras.

Getting started

Scan a malicious model on Hugging Face:

pip install picklescan
picklescan --huggingface ykilcher/totally-harmless-model

The scanner reports that the Pickle is calling eval() to execute arbitrary code:

https://huggingface.co/ykilcher/totally-harmless-model/resolve/main/pytorch_model.bin:archive/data.pkl: global import '__builtin__ eval' FOUND
----------- SCAN SUMMARY -----------
Scanned files: 1
Infected files: 1
Dangerous globals: 1

The scanner can also load Pickles from local files, directories, URLs, and zip archives (a-la PyTorch):

picklescan --path downloads/pytorch_model.bin
picklescan --path downloads
picklescan --url https://huggingface.co/sshleifer/tiny-distilbert-base-cased-distilled-squad/resolve/main/pytorch_model.bin

To scan Numpy's .npy files, pip install the numpy package first.

The scanner exit status codes are (a-la ClamAV):

  • 0: scan did not find malware
  • 1: scan found malware
  • 2: scan failed

Develop

Create and activate the conda environment (miniconda is sufficient):

conda env create -f conda.yaml
conda activate picklescan

Install the package in editable mode to develop and test:

python3 -m pip install -e .

Edit with VS Code:

code .

Run unit tests:

pytest tests

Run manual tests:

  • Local PyTorch (zip) file
mkdir downloads
wget -O downloads/pytorch_model.bin https://huggingface.co/ykilcher/totally-harmless-model/resolve/main/pytorch_model.bin
picklescan -l DEBUG -p downloads/pytorch_model.bin
  • Remote PyTorch (zip) URL
picklescan -l DEBUG -u https://huggingface.co/prajjwal1/bert-tiny/resolve/main/pytorch_model.bin

Lint the code:

black src tests --line-length 140
flake8 src tests --count --show-source

Publish the package to PyPI: bump the package version in setup.cfg and create a GitHub release. This triggers the publish workflow.

Alternative manual steps to publish the package:

python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip
python3 -m pip install --upgrade build
python3 -m build
python3 -m twine upload dist/*

Test the package: bump the version of picklescan in conda.test.yaml and run

conda env remove -n picklescan-test
conda env create -f conda.test.yaml
conda activate picklescan-test
picklescan --huggingface ykilcher/totally-harmless-model

Tested on Linux 5.10.102.1-microsoft-standard-WSL2 x86_64 (WSL2).

References

Download files

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Source Distribution

picklescan-0.0.29.tar.gz (28.6 kB view details)

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picklescan-0.0.29-py3-none-any.whl (21.0 kB view details)

Uploaded Python 3

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  • Download URL: picklescan-0.0.29.tar.gz
  • Upload date:
  • Size: 28.6 kB
  • Tags: Source
  • Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? No
  • Uploaded via: twine/6.1.0 CPython/3.9.23

File hashes

Hashes for picklescan-0.0.29.tar.gz
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 7a645ae610233a48284ff59c6a7c769ad03ae9ceeba56d262faaa31a01193ff2
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BLAKE2b-256 81a4e44e588071a4d9b8f176be56c41cdbc19a6424d29ef2d8e5fdc4078af345

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File details

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File metadata

  • Download URL: picklescan-0.0.29-py3-none-any.whl
  • Upload date:
  • Size: 21.0 kB
  • Tags: Python 3
  • Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? No
  • Uploaded via: twine/6.1.0 CPython/3.9.23

File hashes

Hashes for picklescan-0.0.29-py3-none-any.whl
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 a33a470ecd3e0f3b22d10a53aaa2eca36136e19094973f806d101b847aba5d1d
MD5 f2f6c442d9ce6c2d5d9320abe4eeafac
BLAKE2b-256 b01bb6bf753045452d3ec950a7489703f63597e42b208acd8476e2db73fd3e9c

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Release history Release notifications | RSS feed

1.0.5

2 files

1.0.4

2 files

1.0.3

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1.0.2

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1.0.1

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1.0.0

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This release

0.0.29 This release

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0.0.3

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0.0.1

2 files

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