Show HN: Safe-install – safer NPM installs with trusted build dependencies

Show HN: Safe-install – safer NPM installs with trusted build dependencies(npmjs.com)

18 points by gkiely 6 days ago | 5 comments

In light of the ongoing npm supply chain compromises, I built safe-install:

https://www.npmjs.com/package/@gkiely/safe-install

It brings a couple of protections I wanted from npm but are not built in.

Similar to Bun’s trusted dependencies, it lets you disable install scripts by default and define a list of dependencies that are allowed to run build/install scripts:

https://bun.com/docs/guides/install/trusted

It also supports blocking exotic sub-dependencies, similar to pnpm’s `blockExoticSubdeps` setting:

https://gajus.com/blog/3-pnpm-settings-to-protect-yourself-f...

I was hoping npm would eventually add something like this, but it does not seem to be happening soon, so I made a small package for it.

pjmlp 6 days ago |

The solution already exists.

Nexus, Artifactory, and many others.

Security minded organisations don't allow cowboy installs into projects, the systems are configured to use internal repos and only IT validated packages got uploaded into them.

Still it might be of value to single devs.

gkiely 5 days ago | |

Yeah, this is just for anyone using node on their local machine.

Enabling `ignore-scripts=true` protects you from almost all of the recent compromises `min-release-age=3` protects you from the rest. But you still typically need trusted dependency builds, which this script solves.

I hope that npm enables this by default in the future.

jaen 5 days ago |

but... why not just use pnpm? It's generally a straightforward migration.

It has dependency cooldowns, build scripts disabled by default, and the setting you mentioned.

gkiely 5 days ago | |

The simplest reason might be that it's not the default so people use npm out of habit.

Personally, I use volta and switch between node versions in different projects, so I prefer to just use npm.

edoceo 6 days ago |

Yet again I'm asking folk to look at this artifact mirror that was Show HN a few months ago.

https://github.com/artifact-keeper

It's currently my favourite package gate keeper - after a few years of self-built jank