Build Application Firewalls Target CI/CD Supply Chain Attacks
Summary
The article argues CI/CD scanners can miss malicious dependencies and unknown vulnerabilities, and presents InvisiRisk’s build application firewall as a way to enforce build-time policies, inspect package behavior, and improve SBOM provenance.
Key points
- The article cites the compromised Axios npm package and attacks involving Trivy, LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics as examples of supply-chain threats reaching CI/CD environments.
- It says scanners may miss malicious behavior that appears benign or vulnerabilities that are not yet known.
- InvisiRisk says its build application firewall monitors activity during builds and can enforce user-defined policies.
- The company says deep packet inspection can identify unexpected activity, including secrets being sent to destinations that might otherwise appear acceptable.
- InvisiRisk says its TruSBOM tool observes software during the build to identify components, dependencies, and provenance; these are vendor claims.
Article Details
- Event Type
- Software supply chain attacks targeting development tools, dependencies, and CI/CD build processes.
- Impact
- The article reports that malicious Axios versions were published after North Korean actors hijacked a maintainer’s account; it says around 3% of the Axios userbase is believed to have downloaded them before removal. TeamPCP compromised Trivy, LiteLLM, and KICS to gain access to CI/CD environments. Mercor said it was one of thousands of companies affected by an attack involving LiteLLM, and the European Commission lost 300 GB of data in an attack using an API key compromised in the Trivy supply chain attack. The article also cites the 2020 SolarWinds attack, which affected around 18,000 organizations.
MITRE ATT&CK
People
Threat Actors
Vendors
Aqua SecuritySeparately, but also in February/March 2026, TeamPCP compromised Aqua’s Trivy vulnerability scanner, BerriAI’s LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics.BerriAISeparately, but also in February/March 2026, TeamPCP compromised Aqua’s Trivy vulnerability scanner, BerriAI’s LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics.CheckmarxSeparately, but also in February/March 2026, TeamPCP compromised Aqua’s Trivy vulnerability scanner, BerriAI’s LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics.InvisiRisk“If we don’t know there’s a vulnerability, we just let the package in,” comments David Pulaski, co-founder at InvisiRisk.
Products
AxiosIn March 2026, North Korean actors hijacked an Axios npm library maintainer’s account and published two malicious versions.KICSSeparately, but also in February/March 2026, TeamPCP compromised Aqua’s Trivy vulnerability scanner, BerriAI’s LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics.LiteLLMSeparately, but also in February/March 2026, TeamPCP compromised Aqua’s Trivy vulnerability scanner, BerriAI’s LiteLLM, and Checkmarx/kics.