Syft, Grype, and Grant with Alan Pope
Open Source Security
I chat with Alan Pope about the open source security tools Syft, Grype, and Grant. These tools help create Software Bills of Materials (SBOMs) and scan for vulnerabilities. Learn why generating and storing SBOMs is crucial for understanding your software supply chain and quickly responding to new threats like Log4Shell. The show notes and blog post for this episode can be found at
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CVE for EOL with Aaron Frost
Open Source Security
Aaron Frost explores the overly complex world of vulnerability identifiers for end of life software. We discuss how incomplete CVE reporting creates blind spots for users while arming attackers with knowledge. The conversation uncovers the ethical tensions between resource constraints and security transparency, highlighting why the "vulnerable until proven otherwise" approach is the best path forward for end of life software. The show notes and blog post for this episode can be found at
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cargo-semver-checks with Predrag Gruevski
Open Source Security
Cargo Semver Checks is a Rust tool by Predrag Gruevski that is tackling the problem of broken dependencies that cost developers time when trying to upgrade dependencies. Predrag's work shows how automated checks can catch breaking changes before they're released, potentially saving projects from unexpected failures and making dependency updates less painful across the entire Rust ecosystem. The show notes and blog post for this episode can be found at
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Distributed CI and Git with Lars Wirzenius
Open Source Security
Lars Wirzenius discusses his innovative CI/CD system Ambient, which uses isolated virtual machines without network access to enhance security, and his work on Radicle, a peer-to-peer Git collaboration platform. Together, these projects offer a glimpse into a more distributed future for software development, addressing key challenges in current CI/CD systems like long wait times, security vulnerabilities, and centralized infrastructure limitations. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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FIDO authentication with William Brown
Open Source Security
William Brown tells us all about how confusing and complicated the FIDO authentication universe is. He talks about WebAuthn implementation challenges to flaws in the FIDO metadata service that affect how hardware tokens are authenticated against. The conversation covers the spectrum of hardware security key quality, attestation mechanisms, and the barriers preventing open source developers from improving industry standards despite their expertise. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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CRA with Luis Villa
Open Source Security
In this episode, open source legal expert Luis Villa breaks down what the EU's Cyber Resilience Act means for developers and businesses, exploring carve-outs for individual contributors and the complex relationship between security and sustainability. Luis provides practical guidance on navigating this evolving regulatory landscape while explaining why the CRA represents both a challenge and an opportunity for the open source ecosystem. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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Open Source Malware with Brian Fox
Open Source Security
Brian Fox discusses findings from a recent Sonatype report about the growing challenge of malicious packages in open source repositories. At the time of recording there are now over 820,000 malware packages in public repositories. Brian explains why certain ecosystems are more vulnerable than others and how behavioral detection methods can identify suspicious packages, and the challenge in solving this problem. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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Open Source Foundations with Kelley Misata of Suricata
Open Source Security
In this episode Open Source Security talks to Dr. Kelly Masada about the Open Information Security Foundation (OISF). The way OISF is managing Suricata through a foundation is super interesting. There are a lot of lessons in this one for both open source projects and existing open source foundations. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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Forking Open Source Projects with Sheogorath
Open Source Security
In this episode Open Source Security chats with Sheogorath about HedgeDoc project's journey from HackMD to CodiMD and finally to HedgeDoc. We learn what forking a project looks like, including license changes (MIT to AGPL), security vulnerability management across different codebases, naming challenges, and infrastructure migrations. The conversation goes through to journey from HackMD to CodiMD and all the lessons learned along the way. And there are many lessons. The blog post for this episode can be found at
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Patching EOL Open Source with Aaron Frost
Open Source Security
In this episode, Open Source Security chats with Aaron Frost, CEO of Hero Devs about the world of maintaining end-of-life open source software. Aaron explains how EOL versions of open source work and how backporting security fixes can help maintaining compliance. In the discussion we cover the "just upgrade" mentality, how backporting works, why it's hard, and why it matters. We also cover some oddities the world of CVE brings to the discussion. The blog post for this episode can be found at
info_outlineJosh and Kurt talk to Seth Larson from the Python Software Foundation about security the Python ecosystem. Seth is an employee of the PSF and is doing some amazing work. Seth is showing what can be accomplished when we pay open source developers to do some of the tasks a volunteer might consider boring, but is super important work.
Show Notes
- Seth Larson
- XKCD PGP Signature
- Seth's Blog
- Python and Sigstore
- Deprecating PGP - PEP 761
- Python SBOMs