Security Trust Report: colors

[email protected]: 46/100 | Grade: C | Tier: CAUTION (confidence: ±3)

Scanned on 2026-04-10 from 8 security databases. View package on npm →

TL;DR

• 2 vulnerabilities found (0 critical, 2 high)
• Consider switching to chalk (Most popular terminal color library)
• Action required: Review flags below and upgrade or replace this package

⚠️ Security Incident Background

In January 2022, maintainer marak deliberately sabotaged the package by adding an infinite loop, causing applications to print garbage text. This was a protest against large corporations using open-source without compensation.

Score Breakdown

Maintainer Trust:  █████████░░░░░░░░░░░ 44/100
Package Health:    ██████████████████░░ 88/100
Supply Chain:      █░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ 5/100
Community:         █████████░░░░░░░░░░░ 47/100

Why this score?

• Maintainer Trust is 44 because: single maintainer (bus factor risk)
• Supply Chain is 5 because: 2 known CVEs, in breach database
• Community is 47 because: no public GitHub repo linked (may be private or on another platform)

Vulnerabilities (2 vulnerabilities)

| Severity | Count | |----------|-------| | 🟠 High | 2 |

• CVE-2021-23567
• GHSA-gh88-3pxp-6fm8
• GHSA-5rqg-jm4f-cqx7

Key Risk Flags

• 🔴 CRITICAL: Package name "colors" is 2 edit(s) from popular "cors"
• 🔴 CRITICAL: HISTORICAL BREACH: Maintainer sabotaged with infinite loop (2022)
• 🔴 CRITICAL: Maintainer "marak" has history of package sabotage
• 🟠 HIGH: 2 HIGH vulnerabilities detected

🛠️ What Should You Do?

Immediate:

• 📌 Pin to known-safe version: 1.4.0 (before sabotage)
• 🔄 Or replace with chalk — Most popular terminal color library
• 📖 Review the security incident above

Always: Pin version, run pkgtrust scan in CI, monitor at nrupak.com/trust/colors

🔄 Safer Alternatives

| Package | Why | npm | Trust Score | |---------|-----|-----|-------------| | chalk | Most popular terminal color library | npm | View score | | picocolors | Tiny, fast, zero dependencies | npm | View score | | kleur | Lightweight alternative | npm | View score |

Maintainers (1)

• ⛔ marak — COMPROMISED: Deliberately sabotaged colors and faker (2022) (Trust profile)

Methodology: 18+ signals across 4 categories (Maintainer 35%, Package 25%, Supply Chain 25%, Community 15%). Full scoring docs →

Check your project: npm i -g @cyberhub/pkgtrust && pkgtrust scan colors — CLI docs Data Sources: GitHub Advisories · OSV.dev · npm audit · Snyk · Socket.dev · npms.io · Bundlephobia · deps.dev · CISA KEV · Packagephobia · OpenSSF Scorecard · Ecosyste.ms · GitHub Enhanced · Keybase · npm Provenance

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This is an automated security report. Not affiliated with the colors team. Updated 2026-04-10.