diff --git a/launcher_scripts/nemo_launcher/collections/eval_harness/lm_eval/base.py b/launcher_scripts/nemo_launcher/collections/eval_harness/lm_eval/base.py
index f23fa6907..a5f848b68 100755
--- a/launcher_scripts/nemo_launcher/collections/eval_harness/lm_eval/base.py
+++ b/launcher_scripts/nemo_launcher/collections/eval_harness/lm_eval/base.py
@@ -23,7 +23,16 @@
 import numpy as np
 import spacy
 from lm_eval.metrics import mean, weighted_mean, weighted_perplexity
-from sqlitedict import SqliteDict
+
+try:
+    from sqlitedict import SqliteDict
+
+    HAS_SQLITEDICT = True
+except ImportError:
+    print(
+        "Eval harness with sqlitedict is deprecated. Sqlitedict has known vulnerability GHSA-g4r7-86gm-pgqc"
+    )
+    HAS_SQLITEDICT = False
 
 
 def _SPACY_NLP(*args, **kwargs):
@@ -607,7 +616,10 @@ def __init__(self, lm, cache_db):
         self.cache_db = cache_db
         if os.path.dirname(cache_db):
             os.makedirs(os.path.dirname(cache_db), exist_ok=True)
-        self.dbdict = SqliteDict(cache_db, autocommit=True)
+        if HAS_SQLITEDICT:
+            self.dbdict = SqliteDict(cache_db, autocommit=True)
+        else:
+            self.dbdict = None
 
         # add hook to lm
         lm.set_cache_hook(self.get_cache_hook())
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 84f9b3c7b..2b219f6d0 100755
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -9,7 +9,6 @@ pytablewriter==0.58.0
 requests==2.26.0
 tqdm==4.62.3
 zstandard==0.15.2
-sqlitedict
 hera
 pydantic
 kubeflow-training>=1.8