Workflow Sentry
Audit GitHub Actions locally with privileged-chain checks, immutable-container review, portable baselines, review exceptions, and JSON, Markdown, SARIF, or HTML reports.
The problem it solves
Workflow Sentry Workflow Sentry audits GitHub Actions YAML locally for high-impact security risks before a workflow is merged.
Who Workflow Sentry is for
- Developers and maintainers who need reviewable evidence before changing or releasing software.
- Users working with GitHub Actions, security, static analysis who want the documented v1.2.0 behavior.
- People who prefer an open-source release with visible limitations, source, and license terms.
Intended result
Audit GitHub Actions locally with privileged-chain checks, immutable-container review, portable baselines, review exceptions, and JSON, Markdown, SARIF, or HTML reports.
This summary is reconciled from the current catalog and repository documentation.
Features in v1.2.0
Capabilities below come from the current project README and release documentation.
Add WS010–WS014 for privileged checkout/event/artifact chains, mutable container actions, and remote scripts piped into interpreters.
Recognize list-style workflow triggers as well as string and mapping forms.
Add standalone HTML reports with review state and suggested remediation, plus --list-rules.
Add --root, repeatable --exclude, and baseline-backed --new-only failure control.
Retain existing default failure thresholds, value-free findings, review exceptions, JSON/Markdown/SARIF formats, and read-only analysis.
Verified examples
Screenshots are shown only when the current README references a local source image. Otherwise, repository example files are linked directly.
Verified release evidence
This project does not currently publish a screenshot or dedicated example folder. The current README, tests, changelog, tagged release, and source repository remain the verified examples of its behavior.
Platforms and implementation
The public release claims only the cataloged platforms and technologies.
Supported platforms
- Windows
- macOS
- Linux
Built with
- Python
- PyYAML
What changed in v1.2.0
Add five rules for privileged event chains, attacker-controlled checkout refs, unpinned container action digests, downloaded scripts piped into interpreters, and workflow-run artifact review. Add escaped standalone HTML reports with remediation guidance, a rule inventory, source-root-relative baselines, repeated exclusions, and opt-in failure thresholds for newly introduced findings.
workflow-sentry --list-rules
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --root . --format html --output new-review.html
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --root . --format json --output baseline.json
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --root . --baseline baseline.json --new-only --fail-on high
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --root . --exclude '.github/workflows/fixtures/*'Use the same --root for both baseline creation and comparison. --new-only requires a baseline and changes failure evaluation only; all findings remain in the report. Excluding every source is an input error. WS011/WS014 flag trust-boundary reviews and do not prove exploitation. WS012 accepts full SHA-256 container digests; WS013 recognizes a narrow remote-download pipe pattern. Static analysis still requires human review.
Changelog
Release notes from the canonical v1.2.0 source tag.
- Add WS010–WS014 for privileged checkout/event/artifact chains, mutable container actions, and remote scripts piped into interpreters.
- Recognize list-style workflow triggers as well as string and mapping forms.
- Add standalone HTML reports with review state and suggested remediation, plus
--list-rules. - Add
--root, repeatable--exclude, and baseline-backed--new-onlyfailure control. - Retain existing default failure thresholds, value-free findings, review exceptions, JSON/Markdown/SARIF formats, and read-only analysis.
- Add SARIF source annotations and stable fingerprints, dated review exceptions, baseline comparisons and reusable/composite workflow coverage.
- Added regression coverage for the audited behavior and invalid inputs.
- Added local GitHub Actions workflow discovery and static security auditing.
- Added stable rule codes for permissions, triggers, runners, actions, credentials, secrets, and script injection.
- Added value-free Markdown and JSON reports plus configurable CI failure thresholds.
Quick start
The shortest documented path into the current release.
Before running these source commands, download the v1.2.0 source archive, extract it, and open a terminal in the extracted project folder containing README.md. Follow the tagged README for required runtimes and any platform-specific setup.
python -m pip install .
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --format markdown --output workflow-security.md
workflow-sentry .github/workflows --format json --fail-on highExit status is 1 when a finding meets --fail-on. The default threshold is critical.
Current limitations
These boundaries are part of the product and prevent the page from implying unverified capability.
- Static analysis cannot prove a workflow safe or determine whether referenced third-party code is trustworthy.
- Full commit-SHA pinning is treated as immutable; local and
docker://actions are handled separately. - Expression checks are deliberately narrow and evidence-based, so novel injection patterns may require manual review.
- No network request, GitHub token, repository mutation, telemetry, or workflow execution occurs.
Supported on Python 3.10+ for Windows, macOS, and Linux. Version: v1.2.0.
Privacy and licensing
Review the actual data boundary before using a tool with sensitive inputs.
Privacy and safety
No privacy behavior beyond the current repository documentation is claimed. Review the source, security policy, and input/output behavior before using sensitive material.
License and release
Workflow Sentry is published under MIT. The current cataloged release is v1.2.0, published 2026-09-30.
Related projects
Related projects are selected deterministically from shared catalog tags, category, and implementation technologies—not popularity or paid placement.
Workflow Sentry v1.2.0
Use the tagged release for downloads and release notes. Use the repository for source, issues, contribution guidance, security reporting, and complete documentation.
Page source: current Forge catalog plus README and CHANGELOG from the canonical GitHub release tag. Fingerprint: 0f98c796e29added.