Security audit

worldpop-population

Security checks across malware telemetry and agentic risk

Overview

This is a straightforward WorldPop data downloader with dependency and URL-disclosure caveats, but no hidden or destructive behavior was found.

Install in an isolated Python environment, prefer pinned current versions of requests and tqdm, and review the printed download URL before saving large files. The skill does not need API keys or special privileges, but it can download large public datasets and create the output directory you specify.

SkillSpector

By NVIDIA

Vulnerability Patterns

Supply ChainUnpinned Dependencies, External Script Fetching, Obfuscated Code
MCP Tool PoisoningHidden Instructions, Unicode Deception, Parameter Description Injection
Prompt InjectionInstruction Override, Hidden Instructions, Exfiltration Commands
Data ExfiltrationExternal Transmission, Env Variable Harvesting, File System Enumeration
Privilege EscalationExcessive Permissions, Sudo/Root Execution, Credential Access

Findings (4)

Intent-Code Divergence

Medium

Confidence: 93% confidence
Finding: The privacy notice states that the tool sends requests only to www.worldpop.org, but the download flow trusts and fetches whatever file URL is returned in dataset metadata. If the upstream API is compromised, misconfigured, or returns third-party URLs, the tool can make unexpected outbound requests and transfer user IP/addressing data to non-WorldPop hosts, violating the stated privacy and trust boundary.

Unpinned Dependencies

Low

Category: Supply Chain
Content: requests>=2.28.0 tqdm>=4.64.0
Confidence: 97% confidence
Finding: requests>=2.28.0

Unpinned Dependencies

Low

Category: Supply Chain
Content: requests>=2.28.0 tqdm>=4.64.0
Confidence: 97% confidence
Finding: tqdm>=4.64.0

Known Vulnerable Dependency: requests==2.28.0 — 8 advisory(ies): CVE-2024-47081 (Requests vulnerable to .netrc credentials leak via malicious URLs); CVE-2024-35195 (Requests `Session` object does not verify requests after making first request wi); CVE-2026-25645 (Requests has Insecure Temp File Reuse in its extract_zipped_paths() utility func) +5 more

High

Category: Supply Chain
Confidence: 95% confidence
Finding: requests==2.28.0

VirusTotal

65/65 vendors flagged this skill as clean.

View on VirusTotal

Static analysis

Detected: suspicious.dynamic_code_execution

Dynamic code execution detected.

Critical

Code: suspicious.dynamic_code_execution
Location: tests/test_worldpop-population.py:15