Arbiter is an alpha-stage security product. Reports that help close real bypasses, replay paths, trust-boundary breaks, or bundle-distribution weaknesses are especially valuable.

At the moment, security fixes are targeted at the current main branch and the latest published state of the repository.

Please do not open a public GitHub issue for suspected vulnerabilities.

Use one of these non-public paths instead:

• GitHub private vulnerability reporting for this repository, if it is enabled.
• Email the maintainer at malhotra.yajas@gmail.com if private reporting is not enabled.

Please include:

• a clear description of the issue,
• affected component or path,
• reproduction steps or proof of concept,
• impact assessment if known,
• any suggested mitigation if you have one.

You can use the repository name arbiter and the commit SHA you tested against.

Examples of high-signal reports:

• bypassing policy enforcement,
• executing a tool without a valid signed allow token,
• forging or replaying execution tokens,
• bypassing required-context checks,
• trust-boundary failures between gateway, interceptor, executor, OPA, Redis, or control plane,
• unauthorized bundle fetch, tampering, or signature bypass,
• privilege-escalation paths in control-plane approval, token, or signing-key workflows,
• vulnerabilities that break auditability or integrity of rollout state.

These are usually not treated as security vulnerabilities by themselves:

• use of development defaults in local-only demos,
• findings that require repository write access or operator shell access,
• missing hardening that is already documented as alpha or not-yet-supported,
• general best-practice suggestions without a concrete exploit path.

If a report lands in a gray area, it will still be reviewed.

• We will acknowledge receipt of a credible report.
• We may ask follow-up questions or request a narrower proof of concept.
• We prefer coordinated disclosure after a fix or mitigation is available.
• When a fix ships, we may document the issue in release notes or repository history.

Even with Arbiter in place, operators should still use:

• least-privilege credentials for real tools,
• executor isolation or sandboxing where appropriate,
• external secret management,
• network and identity controls around the control plane and policy distribution path.

Arbiter is a guardrail layer, not a full security boundary by itself.