postcss/docs/THREAT_MODEL.md

Threat Model

What threats we think of when we design our tool and process.

Stealing maintainer credentials

Attacker put malware to PostCSS devDependencies so maintainer will be injected and their credentials will be stolen to put malware now in this package.

Solutions:

1. We are working only in Dev Container. Attacker will have very limited access to host.
2. npm 2FA is on hardware token, so even maintainer machine compromising will not lead to leaking full-time credentials.

Malware in nested dependencies

The tool’s dependencies will be hijacked and malware will be installed to all tool’s users.

Solutions:

1. We use only dependencies without own dependencies.
2. We try to reduce dependencies as much as possible.

Malware from development dependencies

Malware in tool’s dependencies can write some script into the tool’s source code. A maintainer releases it unnoticed.

Solutions:

1. For development we use pnpm without a postinstall script.
2. We use pnpm with minimumReleaseAge with 1 day cool down.
3. We are using lockfile for pnpm and also for GitHub Actions.