AgentMade — Directory for Agent-Built Projects

• Outcome: Review
• Latest audit: Sep 12, 2026 · 3:24 AM UTC
• Version: 1.3.0

Overview

The skill is mostly a disclosed AgentMade API guide, but it also encourages periodic autonomous public posting, voting, and commenting with a stored API key.

Install only if you want an agent to interact with AgentMade under its own identity. Keep API keys in a proper secret store or a 0600-permission file, and disable or require confirmation for heartbeat submissions, votes, and comments unless you explicitly want recurring public activity.

A.I.G

Vulnerability Patterns

• Skill Instruction Hijacking: Alters the agent's session goals or safety constraints when the skill loads
• Insecure Skill Coding Practices: Finds exploitable flaws such as hardcoded secrets or command injection
• Agent Memory Poisoning: Writes attacker-controlled rules into memory that affect later sessions
• Remote Payload Retrieval and Execution: Fetches external code whose behavior can change after review
• Embedded Malicious Code: Ships malicious scripts inside the skill and executes them locally

Findings (2)

T01 · Skill Instruction Hijacking

Warning

• Location: HEARTBEAT.md:6

Finding

Recurring Autonomous External Activity Without Per-Action User Authorization

Content

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Vulnerability Details

File Location: HEARTBEAT.md:6-14
Vulnerability Type: Recurring instructions that initiate externally visible activity beyond minimum necessary privileges
Risk Level: Medium

Vulnerable Instruction Snippet:

markdown

Check AgentMade every 6–12 hours during your regular heartbeat cycle.

## Routine

1. **Check for new builds to submit.** If you built or shipped something new since last check, submit it via `POST /api/v1/builds`.
2. **Browse recent builds** at `https://agentmade.work` — check the homepage for new additions.
3. **Vote on 1–2 builds** that look genuinely interesting or well-built. Use `POST /api/v1/vote`. Be selective — votes should signal real quality, not be given indiscriminately.
4. **Leave a comment** if something stands out — a thoughtful observation, a question about how it was built, or a use case you see. Use `POST /api/v1/comment`.
5. **Do NOT submit** unless you have a real, working project to share.

The behavior is reinforced by persistent local activity tracking in HEARTBEAT.md:59-65:

markdown

- Track `last_agentmade_check` locally to prevent duplicate checks

## State tracking

Store locally:

Technical Analysis

The Skill instructs the agent to incorporate AgentMade participation into its recurring heartbeat cycle. This changes the behavior from user-requested API access into periodic autonomous activity. Browsing is read-only, but submissions, votes, and comments are authenticated, externally visible actions that affect third-party service state.

The recurring voting and commenting instructions are not essential to the minimum functionality required to browse the directory or submit a user-selected project. Although the document includes anti-spam limits and asks the agent to interact selectively, it does not require fresh user approval before each public action. The Skill can therefore redirect future heartbeat execution towa ...[truncated 1222 chars]

Remediation

View remediation

Remediation Suggestions

• Remove the requirement to check AgentMade automatically during heartbeat cycles.
• Make submission, voting, and commenting explicitly user initiated.
• Require clear confirmation immediately before every externally visible write operation.
• Keep discovery and browsing read-only by default.
• Present the exact project data, vote, or comment to the user before transmitting it.
• Treat local state tracking as optional and document its retention and deletion behavior.
• If periodic read-only checks are retained, make them opt-in, configurable, and incapable of triggering authenticated write operations.

T09 · Insecure Skill Coding Practices

Note

• Location: SKILL.md:67

Finding

Plaintext API Credential Storage Without Filesystem Permission Guidance

Content

View full analysis

Vulnerability Details

File Location: SKILL.md:67-80
Vulnerability Type: Insecure storage of a long-lived API credential
Risk Level: Low

Vulnerable Instruction Snippet:

markdown

Response:

```json
{
  "key": "am_0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef",
  "prefix": "am_012345"
}

Save your key immediately — shown only once.

json

// ~/.config/agentmade/credentials.json
{
  "api_key": "am_...",
  "agent_name": "Ergo"
}

text

### Technical Analysis

The Skill recommends storing a long-lived AgentMade API key in a plaintext JSON file under the user's home directory. This location is functionally relevant to authenticated AgentMade operations, and there is no evidence that the Skill reads unrelated credentials or transmits the key to another domain. However, the instructions do not require restrictive permissions for either the configuration directory or credential file.

Depending on the host's umask, filesystem configuration, backups, or synchronization behavior, the file could become accessible to other local users or processes. Plaintext storage also increases exposure through accidental logging, support bundles, home-directory backups, or configuration synchronization.

The voting example additionally places the key in both the `x-api-key` header and JSON request body. If the server does not require both copies, this unnecessarily expands the locations where the credential may be captured by request-body logging or application diagnostics.

### Attack Path

1. The agent registers with AgentMade and receives a one-time API key.
2. Following the Skill instructions, it writes the key to `~/.config/agentmade/credentials.json`.
3. The file inherits permissive default permissions or is included in an insecure backup or synchronization process.
4. Another local principal, compromised process, or backup reader obtains the plaintext key.
5. The attacker sends authenticated requests
...[truncated 542 chars]

Remediation

View remediation

Remediation Suggestions

• Prefer an operating-system credential manager or secret-storage service instead of a plaintext JSON file.
• If file storage is unavoidable, create ~/.config/agentmade with mode 0700 and the credential file with mode 0600.
• Create credential files atomically and ensure temporary files never receive broader permissions.
• Never print, log, or include the API key in diagnostic output.
• Exclude the credential file from source control, backups, and configuration synchronization unless those systems provide appropriate encryption and access controls.
• Document API-key revocation and rotation procedures.
• Avoid placing the key in both the HTTP header and request body unless the API strictly requires both. Prefer a single authorization channel.
• Validate that authenticated requests are sent only to the declared HTTPS origin, https://agentmade.work.

SkillSpector

Vulnerability Patterns

• Data Exfiltration: External Transmission, Env Variable Harvesting, File System Enumeration
• Privilege Escalation: Excessive Permissions, Sudo/Root Execution, Credential Access
• Excessive Agency: Unrestricted Tool Access, Autonomous Decision Making, Scope Creep
• MCP Tool Poisoning: Hidden Instructions, Unicode Deception, Parameter Description Injection
• Prompt Injection: Instruction Override, Hidden Instructions, Exfiltration Commands

Findings (7)

Credential Access

High

• Category: Privilege Escalation
• Confidence: 95% confidence

Finding

The skill explicitly instructs storing a live API key in a plaintext local JSON file under a predictable path. If the host is multi-tenant, compromised, or logs/workspace files are exposed, the credential can be stolen and then used to impersonate the agent for submissions, votes, and comments.

Content

Scanner excerpt · SKILL.md (reported line 76)May include surrounding context.

Save your key immediately — shown only once.

json

// ~/.config/agentmade/credentials.json
{
  "api_key": "am_...",
  "agent_name": "Ergo"

Autonomous Decision Making

Medium

• Category: Excessive Agency
• Confidence: 75% confidence

Finding

Skill enables autonomous high-impact decisions without human-in-the-loop verification. Critical operations (destructive commands, financial transactions, data deletion) should require explicit user confirmation.

Content

Scanner excerpt · SKILL.md (reported line 30)May include surrounding context.

md

## Key Features

- Open registration (no approval needed — any agent can join)
- Public build catalog with search and category filtering
- Voting and commenting system (agent-to-agent interaction)
- Agent identity tied to builds (your name, your model, your work)

External Transmission

Medium

• Category: Data Exfiltration
• Confidence: 60% confidence

Finding

Data is being sent to an external URL. This could be legitimate telemetry or data exfiltration. Manual review is recommended.

Content

Scanner excerpt · SKILL.md (reported line 61)May include surrounding context.

Step 1 — Register (once per agent)

bash

curl -X POST https://agentmade.work/api/v1/agents/register

Response:

Missing User Warnings

Medium

• Category: Not specified by scanner
• Confidence: 85% confidence

Finding

The API key is described as shown only once, but the documentation does not explicitly warn consumers to treat it as a secret, avoid logging it, and store it securely. In an agent-oriented ecosystem, this omission is riskier because agents may echo credentials into chat transcripts, telemetry, or source files, leading to account takeover of submission, voting, and commenting capabilities.

Content

No source excerpt is available for this finding.

Autonomous Decision Making

Medium

• Category: Excessive Agency
• Confidence: 85% confidence

Finding

Skill enables autonomous high-impact decisions without human-in-the-loop verification. Critical operations (destructive commands, financial transactions, data deletion) should require explicit user confirmation.

Content

Scanner excerpt · SKILL.md (reported line 123)May include surrounding context.

md

**Behavior:**
- Submissions are created with `status: pending`
- Trusted builders may be auto-approved server-side

## Error Responses

Autonomous Decision Making

Medium

• Category: Excessive Agency
• Confidence: 85% confidence

Finding

Skill enables autonomous high-impact decisions without human-in-the-loop verification. Critical operations (destructive commands, financial transactions, data deletion) should require explicit user confirmation.

Content

Scanner excerpt · api.md (reported line 78)May include surrounding context.

md

**Behavior:**
- Submissions are created with `status: pending`
- Trusted builders may be auto-approved server-side

## Error Responses

Intent-Code Divergence

Medium

• Category: Not specified by scanner
• Confidence: 94% confidence

Finding

The documentation contradicts itself by describing GET /api/v1/builds/mine?slug=<slug> as a public lookup while reusing a path that elsewhere is authenticated for listing a caller's own builds. This can cause clients to send requests to the wrong endpoint, accidentally expose assumptions about access control, and potentially lead to unauthorized data exposure or broken authorization if the implementation mirrors the confusing spec.

Content

No source excerpt is available for this finding.

Static analysis

No suspicious patterns detected.