> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://developer.harness.io/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://developer.harness.io/security-testing-orchestration/use-sto/sto-scanner-configuration/github-advanced-security.md).

# GitHub Advanced Security step configuration

Scan code repositories with GitHub Advanced Security (GHAS).

The GitHub Advanced Security (GHAS) step in Harness STO enables you to scan your code repositories from the following GHAS products:

* [**CodeQL**](#codeql) **(SAST):** Identify code vulnerabilities. Supported in [**Orchestration**](#scan-mode), [**Extraction**](#scan-mode), and [**Ingestion**](#scan-mode).
* [**Dependabot**](#dependabot) **(SCA):** Detect vulnerable open-source dependencies. Supported in [**Orchestration**](#scan-mode), [**Extraction**](#scan-mode), and [**Ingestion**](#scan-mode).
* [**Secret Scanning**](#secret-scanning)**:** Detect exposed secrets such as API keys and tokens. Supported in [**Extraction**](#scan-mode) and [**Ingestion**](#scan-mode).

{% hint style="info" %}

* To run scans as a non-root user, you can use custom STO scan images and pipelines. See [Configure your pipeline to use STO images from private registry](/security-testing-orchestration/troubleshooting-and-resources/sto-use-cases/set-up-sto-pipelines/configure-pipeline-to-use-sto-images-from-private-registry.md).
* STO supports multiple workflows for loading self-signed certificates. See [Run STO scans with custom SSL certificates](/security-testing-orchestration/troubleshooting-and-resources/sto-use-cases/secure-sto-pipelines/ssl-setup-in-sto.md#supported-workflows-for-adding-custom-ssl-certificates).
  {% endhint %}

### GitHub Advanced Security step settings <a href="#github-advanced-security-step-settings" id="github-advanced-security-step-settings"></a>

The recommended workflow is to add a GitHub Advanced Security step to a **Security** or **Build** stage and configure it as described below.

#### Scan <a href="#scan" id="scan"></a>

**Scan Mode**

* **Orchestration**: Executes the scan, normalizes, and deduplicates results. Supported for **CodeQL** and **Dependabot**.

  <div data-gb-custom-block data-tag="hint" data-style="info" class="hint hint-info"><ul><li>To comply with <a href="https://docs.github.com/en/get-started/learning-about-github/about-github-advanced-security#about-github-advanced-security-products">GitHub’s licensing requirements</a>, orchestration scans are uploaded to GitHub and then imported into STO.</li><li><strong>Orchestration</strong> mode currently supports <em>Python (pip)</em> and <em>JavaScript/TypeScript (npm or yarn)</em>. <strong>Extraction</strong> mode supports all languages available in GHAS.</li></ul></div>
* **Extraction**: Pulls existing results from GitHub APIs (**CodeQL**, **Dependabot**, **Secret Scanning**).
* **Ingestion**: Ingests SARIF files from previously run GHAS scans.

**Scan Configuration**

The predefined configuration to use for the scan. All scan steps have at least one configuration.

The GitHub Advanced Security step supports the following configurations:

* [**CodeQL**](#codeql)
* [**Dependabot**](#dependabot)
* [**Secret Scanning**](#secret-scanning)

#### CodeQL <a href="#codeql" id="codeql"></a>

You can use **CodeQL** to perform Static Application Security Testing (SAST). For details about CodeQL itself, see the [CodeQL documentation](https://docs.github.com/en/code-security/code-scanning/introduction-to-code-scanning/about-code-scanning-with-codeql).

Here are a few important points to note when using CodeQL with **Orchestration mode**:

* The repository must be configured with **Advanced setup** for **CodeQL analysis**. To do this, go to your repository settings, click on **Advanced Security**, then go to **Code scanning** section and select **Advanced setup** for **CodeQL analysis**. If you're using default setup, you must switch to Advanced setup before running scans with Orchestration scan mode.

For **Extraction mode**, CodeQL works with both **Default** and **Advanced setup**.

{% hint style="info" %}
The **CodeQL** scan configuration using the [**Orchestration**](#scan-mode) scan mode requires a minimum of `2Gi` of RAM. You can set this in the [**Additional Configuration**](#additional-configuration) section of your step.
{% endhint %}

***

#### Dependabot <a href="#dependabot" id="dependabot"></a>

You can use **Dependabot** for dependency (SCA) scans. For more information, see the [Dependabot documentation](https://docs.github.com/en/code-security/dependabot/dependabot-alerts/about-dependabot-alerts).

Prerequisites for Dependabot scans:

* **Dependabot alerts** must be enabled. To check this, go to your repository settings, select **Advanced Security**, then click on **Enable** for **Dependabot alerts**.
* **Dependabot** with **Orchestration mode** requires a **Docker-in-Docker (DinD)** background step. When you configure this step, set the **Entrypoint** to `dockerd-entrypoint.sh` instead of `dockerd`. For setup instructions, go to [Configure Docker-in-Docker (DinD) for your pipeline](/security-testing-orchestration/use-sto/sto-scanner-configuration/security-step-settings-reference.md#configuring-docker-in-docker-dind-for-your-pipeline).

***

#### Secret Scanning <a href="#secret-scanning" id="secret-scanning"></a>

You can use **Secret Scanning** to detect exposed secrets such as API keys, tokens, or other sensitive values in your repositories. For more details about this feature, see the [Secret Scanning documentation](https://docs.github.com/en/code-security/securing-your-organization/understanding-your-organizations-exposure-to-leaked-secrets/choosing-github-secret-protection).

Prerequisites for Secret Scanning:

* **Secret protection** must be enabled. To enable this, go to your repository settings, click on **Advanced Security**, then click on **Enable** for **Secret Protection**.

#### Target <a href="#target" id="target"></a>

**Type**

* **Repository** Scan a codebase repo.

  In most cases, you specify the codebase using a code repo connector that connects to the Git account or repository where your code is stored. For information, go to [Configure codebase](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/codebase-configuration/create-and-configure-a-codebase.md).

**Target and variant detection**

When **Auto** is enabled for code repositories, the step detects these values using `git`:

* To detect the target, the step runs `git config --get remote.origin.url`.
* To detect the variant, the step runs `git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD`. The default assumption is that the `HEAD` branch is the one you want to scan.

Note the following:

* **Auto** is not available when the **Scan Mode** is **Ingestion**.
* By default, **Auto** is selected when you add the step. You can change this setting if needed.

**Name**

The identifier for the [target](/security-testing-orchestration/new-to-sto/key-concepts/targets-and-baselines.md), such as `codebaseAlpha` or `jsmith/myalphaservice`. Descriptive target names make it much easier to navigate your scan data in the STO UI.

It is good practice to [specify a baseline](/security-testing-orchestration/new-to-sto/key-concepts/targets-and-baselines.md#every-target-needs-a-baseline) for every target.

**Variant**

The identifier for the specific variant to scan. This is usually the branch name, image tag, or product version. Harness maintains a historical trend for each variant.

**Workspace**

The workspace path on the pod running the scan step. The workspace path is `/harness` by default.

You can override this if you want to scan only a subset of the workspace. For example, suppose the pipeline publishes artifacts to a subfolder `/tmp/artifacts` and you want to scan these artifacts only. In this case, you can specify the workspace path as `/harness/tmp/artifacts`.

Additionally, you can specify individual files to scan as well. For instance, if you only want to scan a specific file like `/tmp/iac/infra.tf`, you can specify the workspace path as `/harness/tmp/iac/infra.tf`

#### Ingestion File <a href="#ingestion-file" id="ingestion-file"></a>

The path to your scan results when running an [Ingestion scan](/security-testing-orchestration/new-to-sto/key-concepts/ingest-scan-results-into-an-sto-pipeline.md), for example `/shared/scan_results/myscan.latest.sarif`.

* The data file must be in a [supported format](/security-testing-orchestration/new-to-sto/sto-whats-supported/scanners.md#supported-ingestion-formats) for the scanner.
* The data file must be accessible to the scan step. It's good practice to save your results files to a [shared path](/continuous-integration/new-to-harness-ci/key-concepts.md#stages) in your stage. In the visual editor, go to the stage where you're running the scan. Then go to **Overview** > **Shared Paths**. You can also add the path to the YAML stage definition like this:

  ```yaml
      - stage:
        spec:
          sharedPaths:
            - /shared/scan_results
  ```

#### Authentication <a href="#authentication" id="authentication"></a>

**Access Token**

The access token to log in to the scanner. This is usually a password or an API key.

You should create a Harness text secret with your encrypted token and reference the secret using the format `<+secrets.getValue("my-access-token")>`. For more information, go to [Add and Reference Text Secrets](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/secrets/add-use-text-secrets.md).

Use a GitHub fine-grained **Personal Access Token (PAT)** with the following repository permissions:

| **Scan Mode**                                        | **Permission**         | **Level**    |
| ---------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------- | ------------ |
| **Orchestration** (CodeQL, Dependabot)               | Code scanning alerts   | Read & Write |
|                                                      | Dependabot alerts      | Read & Write |
|                                                      | Secret scanning alerts | Read & Write |
| **Extraction** (CodeQL, Dependabot, Secret Scanning) | Code scanning alerts   | Read-only    |
|                                                      | Dependabot alerts      | Read-only    |
|                                                      | Secret scanning alerts | Read-only    |

Make sure **Repository access** is set to *All repositories* or *Only selected repositories*.

#### Log Level <a href="#log-level" id="log-level"></a>

The minimum severity of the messages you want to include in your scan logs. You can specify one of the following:

* **DEBUG**
* **INFO**
* **WARNING**
* **ERROR**

#### Fail on Severity <a href="#fail-on-severity" id="fail-on-severity"></a>

Every STO scan step has a **Fail on Severity** setting. If the scan finds any vulnerability with the specified [severity level](/security-testing-orchestration/new-to-sto/key-concepts/severities.md) or higher, the pipeline fails automatically. You can specify one of the following:

* **`CRITICAL`**
* **`HIGH`**
* **`MEDIUM`**
* **`LOW`**
* **`INFO`**
* **`NONE`** — Do not fail on severity

The YAML definition looks like this: `fail_on_severity : critical # | high | medium | low | info | none`

#### Additional Configuration <a href="#additional-configuration" id="additional-configuration"></a>

The fields under **Additional Configuration** vary based on the type of infrastructure. Depending on the infrastructure type selected, some fields may or may not appear in your settings. Below are the details for each field

* Override Security Test Image
  * [Container Registry](/security-testing-orchestration/troubleshooting-and-resources/sto-use-cases/set-up-sto-pipelines/configure-pipeline-to-use-sto-images-from-private-registry.md#step-level-override)
  * [Image Tag](/security-testing-orchestration/troubleshooting-and-resources/sto-use-cases/set-up-sto-pipelines/configure-pipeline-to-use-sto-images-from-private-registry.md#step-level-override)
* [Privileged](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/manage-dependencies/background-step-settings.md#privileged)
* [Image Pull Policy](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/manage-dependencies/background-step-settings.md#image-pull-policy)
* [Run as User](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/manage-dependencies/background-step-settings.md#run-as-user)
* [Set Container Resources](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/manage-dependencies/background-step-settings.md#set-container-resources)
* [Timeout](/continuous-integration/use-harness-ci/use-harness-ci/run-step-settings.md#timeout)

#### Advanced Settings <a href="#advanced-settings" id="advanced-settings"></a>

In the **Advanced** settings, you can use the following options:

* [Conditional Execution](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/pipelines/step-skip-condition-settings.md)
* [Failure Strategy](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/pipelines/failure-handling/define-a-failure-strategy-on-stages-and-steps.md)
* [Looping Strategy](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/pipelines/looping-strategies/looping-strategies-matrix-repeat-and-parallelism.md)
* [Policy Enforcement](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/governance/policy-as-code/harness-governance-overview.md)

### Proxy settings <a href="#proxy-settings" id="proxy-settings"></a>

This step supports private network connectivity if you're using Harness Cloud infrastructure. For information on connectivity options, see [Private network connectivity options](/harness-ai/use-harness-platform/references/private-network-connectivity/private-network-connectivity.md). When using proxy configurations, the `HTTPS_PROXY` and `HTTP_PROXY` variables are automatically set to route traffic through the secure tunnel. If there are specific addresses that you want to bypass the proxy, you can define those in the `NO_PROXY` variable. This can be configured in the **Settings** of your step.

If you need to configure a different proxy, you can manually set the `HTTPS_PROXY`, `HTTP_PROXY`, and `NO_PROXY` variables in the **Settings** of your step.

**Definitions of Proxy variables:**

* `HTTPS_PROXY`: Specify the proxy server for HTTPS requests, example `https://sc.internal.harness.io:30000`
* `HTTP_PROXY`: Specify the proxy server for HTTP requests, example `http://sc.internal.harness.io:30000`
* `NO_PROXY`: Specify the domains as comma-separated values that should bypass the proxy. This allows you to exclude certain traffic from being routed through the proxy.

{% @harness-feedback/feedback %}