gh-actions-security

A security checklist for GitHub Actions, the service that runs automated jobs in a GitHub repository.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it when creating or editing files in .github/workflows/ to pin actions, limit permissions, and run the zizmor security checker.
Why use it?
It helps prevent workflow changes from using mutable action versions, excessive permissions, or unsafe configuration.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/ericboehs/claude-plugins/gh-actions-security
Any agent
npx skills add ericboehs/claude-plugins --skill gh-actions-security
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/ericboehs/claude-plugins

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 42 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 975 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00042 $0.00975
Opus 5 $0.00021 $0.00487
Sonnet 5 $0.00008 $0.00195
Haiku 4.5 $0.00004 $0.00097

Measured 2d ago against content hash 95d75ec58fda, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

gh-actions-security scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

plugins/gh-actions-security/skills/gh-actions-security/SKILL.md · 111 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 111 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

GitHub Actions Security

Apply this checklist any time a workflow file is created or modified. Fix what's cheap inline; flag the rest.

1. Pin actions to a full commit SHA

Tags are mutable — a compromised action repo can rewrite v4 (see the tj-actions attack). Pin the SHA and keep the tag as a comment:

- uses: actions/checkout@9c091bb21b7c1c1d1991bb908d89e4e9dddfe3e0 # v7.0.0

Resolve latest release → SHA:

tag=$(gh api repos/OWNER/ACTION/releases/latest --jq .tag_name)
gh api repos/OWNER/ACTION/git/ref/tags/$tag --jq '.object | "\(.type) \(.sha)"'
# if type is "tag" (annotated), deref once more: gh api repos/OWNER/ACTION/git/tags/SHA --jq .object.sha

Skim the major-version release notes for breaking changes before jumping versions.

2. Least-privilege permissions

Default-deny at the top, request per-job with a comment saying why:

permissions: {} # default-deny; jobs request exactly what they need

jobs:
  build:
    permissions:
      contents: write # push generated commits back to this repo

3. Lint with zizmor

zizmor .github/workflows/FILE.yml          # brew install zizmor
zizmor --persona=auditor .github/workflows/FILE.yml   # pedantic pass

Known-acceptable finding: artipacked (persist-credentials) when the job pushes commits — otherwise add persist-credentials: false to checkout.

4. Untrusted input

  • Never interpolate attacker-influenced context (github.event.* — PR titles, branch names, issue bodies, commit messages) directly into run:. Route through env: and use the variable quoted.
  • Avoid pull_request_target and workflow_run with fork PRs unless you fully understand the checkout implications. Treat fork PRs as hostile.
  • If the workflow runs a script that ingests external data (API responses, comments, filenames), verify the script's shell-out surface: sanitized interpolations, -F file for commit messages, no eval.

5. Secrets

  • Reference secrets in step-level env:, never inline in run: commands.
  • PATs: prefer fine-grained scoped to one repo; classic PATs are all-or- nothing per scope (e.g. gist scope = ALL gists). Set an expiration and rotate. Gotcha: fine-grained PATs do NOT cover the gist API.
  • Never echo/log secret values; if one hits a log, delete the log AND rotate the secret.

Read the full file on GitHub · 111 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 111 lines · 42 tokens per session scan A 95d75ec58fda

Subscribe to this mod's changes

gh-actions-security is a skill published in the GitHub repository ericboehs/claude-plugins (2 stars, last pushed 9d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 42 tokens to every session and 975 once invoked, about $0.0002 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-31.

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