BadgeApp

Projects that follow the best practices below can voluntarily self-certify and show that they've achieved an Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF) best practices badge.

There is no set of practices that can guarantee that software will never have defects or vulnerabilities; even formal methods can fail if the specifications or assumptions are wrong. Nor is there any set of practices that can guarantee that a project will sustain a healthy and well-functioning development community. However, following best practices can help improve the results of projects. For example, some practices enable multi-person review before release, which can both help find otherwise hard-to-find technical vulnerabilities and help build trust and a desire for repeated interaction among developers from different companies. To earn a badge, all MUST and MUST NOT criteria must be met, all SHOULD criteria must be met OR be unmet with justification, and all SUGGESTED criteria must be met OR unmet (we want them considered at least). If you want to enter justification text as a generic comment, instead of being a rationale that the situation is acceptable, start the text block with '//' followed by a space. Feedback is welcome via the GitHub site as issues or pull requests There is also a mailing list for general discussion.

We gladly provide the information in several locales, however, if there is any conflict or inconsistency between the translations, the English version is the authoritative version.
If this is your project, please show your badge status on your project page! The badge status looks like this: Badge level for project 1 is gold Here is how to embed it:
You can show your badge status by embedding this in your markdown file:
[![OpenSSF Best Practices](https://www.bestpractices.dev/projects/1/badge)](https://www.bestpractices.dev/projects/1)
or by embedding this in your HTML:
<a href="https://www.bestpractices.dev/projects/1"><img src="https://www.bestpractices.dev/projects/1/badge"></a>


These are the Gold level criteria. You can also view the Passing or Silver level criteria.

        

 Basics 5/5 ●

  • Identification

    Note that other projects may use the same name.

    BadgeApp is the web application that allows developers to provide information about their project and (hopefully) get an Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF) Best Practices badge. This project was originally known as the Core Infrastructure Initiative (CII) best practices badge project.

    The Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF) is managed by The Linux Foundation. The OpenSSF Best Practices badge online application (aka the BadgeApp) enables developers to quickly determine whether they are following best practices and to receive a badge they can display on GitHub and other locations. The application and its criteria are an open source project to which developers can contribute.

    You can see the program running, and use it to try to get a badge, by visiting: https://bestpractices.coreinfrastructure.org/

    The BadgeApp is written in Ruby on Rails and Javascript.

    See the development site on GitHub for more about how we secure this application.

    Note that the BadgeApp gets its own badge!

  • Prerequisites


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST achieve a silver level badge. [achieve_silver]

  • Project oversight


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have a "bus factor" of 2 or more. (URL required) [bus_factor]
    A "bus factor" (aka "truck factor") is the minimum number of project members that have to suddenly disappear from a project ("hit by a bus") before the project stalls due to lack of knowledgeable or competent personnel. The truck-factor tool can estimate this for projects on GitHub. For more information, see Assessing the Bus Factor of Git Repositories by Cosentino et al.

    David A. Wheeler, Jason Dossett, and Dan Kohn are all very familiar with the software and could easily continue its maintenance if necessary. Many other people have contributed per CREDITS and several of them could also probably maintain it if absolutely necessary. See GitHub contributors statistics for the latest statistics on contributors.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have at least two unassociated significant contributors. (URL required) [contributors_unassociated]
    Contributors are associated if they are paid to work by the same organization (as an employee or contractor) and the organization stands to benefit from the project's results. Financial grants do not count as being from the same organization if they pass through other organizations (e.g., science grants paid to different organizations from a common government or NGO source do not cause contributors to be associated). Someone is a significant contributor if they have made non-trivial contributions to the project in the past year. Examples of good indicators of a significant contributor are: written at least 1,000 lines of code, contributed 50 commits, or contributed at least 20 pages of documentation.

    There are at least 22 contributors, and at least three significant contributors today: David A. Wheeler (IDA), Jason Dossett (IDA), and Dan Kohn (Linux Foundation). For this work, IDA works for the Core Infrastructure Initiative (CII), which is a project of the Linux Foundation (LF). However, the LF is itself a nonprofit mutual benefit corporation (specifically a Section 501(c)(6)). As a nonprofit mutual benefit corporation, the LF is directed by other organizations which actually provide funding to do this work, and thus the LF and CII can be viewed as "pass through" organizations as described in this criterion.


  • Other


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST include a license statement in each source file. This MAY be done by including the following inside a comment near the beginning of each file: SPDX-License-Identifier: [SPDX license expression for project]. [license_per_file]
    This MAY also be done by including a statement in natural language identifying the license. The project MAY also include a stable URL pointing to the license text, or the full license text. Note that the criterion license_location requires the project license be in a standard location. See this SPDX tutorial for more information about SPDX license expressions. Note the relationship with copyright_per_file, whose content would typically precede the license information.

    Each source file has a copyright statement in its header (MIT). See CONTRIBUTING.md for the instructions for Ruby source files (nearly all source files are in Ruby).


 Change Control 4/4 ●

  • Public version-controlled source repository


    Enough for a badge!

    The project's source repository MUST use a common distributed version control software (e.g., git or mercurial). [repo_distributed]
    Git is not specifically required and projects can use centralized version control software (such as subversion) with justification.

    Uses git. Repository on GitHub, which uses git. git is distributed.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST clearly identify small tasks that can be performed by new or casual contributors. (URL required) [small_tasks]
    This identification is typically done by marking selected issues in an issue tracker with one or more tags the project uses for the purpose, e.g., up-for-grabs, first-timers-only, "Small fix", microtask, or IdealFirstBug. These new tasks need not involve adding functionality; they can be improving documentation, adding test cases, or anything else that aids the project and helps the contributor understand more about the project.

    We use the "up-for-grabs" tag. This is noted on the front page of the repo.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST require two-factor authentication (2FA) for developers for changing a central repository or accessing sensitive data (such as private vulnerability reports). This 2FA mechanism MAY use mechanisms without cryptographic mechanisms such as SMS, though that is not recommended. [require_2FA]

    The Core Infrastructure Initiative (CII) requires two-factor authentication for all organization members and outside collaborators as described in Requiring two-factor authentication in your organization.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project's two-factor authentication (2FA) SHOULD use cryptographic mechanisms to prevent impersonation. Short Message Service (SMS) based 2FA, by itself, does NOT meet this criterion, since it is not encrypted. [secure_2FA]
    A 2FA mechanism that meets this criterion would be a Time-based One-Time Password (TOTP) application that automatically generates an authentication code that changes after a certain period of time. Note that GitHub supports TOTP.

    Project governance specifically documents that SMS is not acceptable; see governance.md.


 Quality 7/7 ●

  • Coding standards


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST document its code review requirements, including how code review is conducted, what must be checked, and what is required to be acceptable. (URL required) [code_review_standards]
    See also two_person_review and contribution_requirements.

    The file CONTRIBUTING.md describes the code review requirements. E.G., changes to the code built on Rails must follow the Rails community style guide. The continuous integration tasks run a large number of checks, e.g., all Ruby code must go through Rubocop, and all JavaScript code must go through ESLint (with the given conditions). We absolutely require that the Ruby code have at least 90% statement coverage, but we typically don't accept statement coverage less than 100%.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have at least 50% of all proposed modifications reviewed before release by a person other than the author, to determine if it is a worthwhile modification and free of known issues which would argue against its inclusion [two_person_review]

    We have a policy in CONTRIBUTING.md that modifications other than low-risk modifications be reviewed by someone else, and a stated goal of having at least 50% of all proposed modifications to be reviewed.


  • Working build system


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have a reproducible build. If no building occurs (e.g., scripting languages where the source code is used directly instead of being compiled), select "not applicable" (N/A). (URL required) [build_reproducible]
    A reproducible build means that multiple parties can independently redo the process of generating information from source files and get exactly the same bit-for-bit result. In some cases, this can be resolved by forcing some sort order. JavaScript developers may consider using npm shrinkwrap and webpack OccurenceOrderPlugin. GCC and clang users may find the -frandom-seed option useful. The build environment (including the toolset) can often be defined for external parties by specifying the cryptographic hash of a specific container or virtual machine that they can use for rebuilding. The reproducible builds project has documentation on how to do this.

    The code is written in Ruby and Javascript, which are not delivered as compiled executables.


  • Automated test suite


    Enough for a badge!

    A test suite MUST be invocable in a standard way for that language. (URL required) [test_invocation]
    For example, "make check", "mvn test", or "rake test" (Ruby).

    Yes. "rake test" invokes the automated test suite. The default "rake" command includes "rake test". This is documented in CONTRIBUTING.md.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST implement continuous integration, where new or changed code is frequently integrated into a central code repository and automated tests are run on the result. (URL required) [test_continuous_integration]
    In most cases this means that each developer who works full-time on the project integrates at least daily.

    Code is frequently integrated back into GitHub; CircleCI and several other tools are then run on the result to determine if there's a problem. If a problem is found, the tools provide feedback via GitHub. For more information, see the BadgeApp's status on CircleCI.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have FLOSS automated test suite(s) that provide at least 90% statement coverage if there is at least one FLOSS tool that can measure this criterion in the selected language. [test_statement_coverage90]

    As of this writing, we have 100% statement coverage, see Codecov.io.


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have FLOSS automated test suite(s) that provide at least 80% branch coverage if there is at least one FLOSS tool that can measure this criterion in the selected language. [test_branch_coverage80]

    There are no top-to-bottom FLOSS tools available in Ruby which can measure branch coverage. Ruby version 2.5 was the first version that enabled capturing branch coverage, and it was only released on 2017-12-25. Other tools on top of Ruby need to be modified so that they can use this information, e.g., simplecov issue 412 proposed adding branch coverage support to simplecov.


 Security 5/5 ●

  • Use basic good cryptographic practices

    Note that some software does not need to use cryptographic mechanisms. If your project produces software that (1) includes, activates, or enables encryption functionality, and (2) might be released from the United States (US) to outside the US or to a non-US-citizen, you may be legally required to take a few extra steps. Typically this just involves sending an email. For more information, see the encryption section of Understanding Open Source Technology & US Export Controls.

    Enough for a badge!

    The software produced by the project MUST support secure protocols for all of its network communications, such as SSHv2 or later, TLS1.2 or later (HTTPS), IPsec, SFTP, and SNMPv3. Insecure protocols such as FTP, HTTP, telnet, SSLv3 or earlier, and SSHv1 MUST be disabled by default, and only enabled if the user specifically configures it. If the software produced by the project does not support network communications, select "not applicable" (N/A). [crypto_used_network]

    https://github.com/linuxfoundation/cii-best-practices-badge


    Enough for a badge!

    The software produced by the project MUST, if it supports or uses TLS, support at least TLS version 1.2. Note that the predecessor of TLS was called SSL. If the software does not use TLS, select "not applicable" (N/A). [crypto_tls12]

    Github uses TLS 1.2, see https://github.com/linuxfoundation/cii-best-practices-badge.


  • Secured delivery against man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks


    Enough for a badge!

    The project website, repository (if accessible via the web), and download site (if separate) MUST include key hardening headers with nonpermissive values. (URL required) [hardened_site]
    Note that GitHub and GitLab are known to meet this. Sites such as https://securityheaders.com/ can quickly check this. The key hardening headers are: Content Security Policy (CSP), HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS), X-Content-Type-Options (as "nosniff"), and X-Frame-Options. Fully static web sites with no ability to log in via the web pages could omit some hardening headers with less risk, but there's no reliable way to detect such sites, so we require these headers even if they are fully static sites.

    We use GitHub, and securityheaders.io verifies that our sites meet this criterion.


  • Other security issues


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST have performed a security review within the last 5 years. This review MUST consider the security requirements and security boundary. [security_review]
    This MAY be done by the project members and/or an independent evaluation. This evaluation MAY be supported by static and dynamic analysis tools, but there also must be human review to identify problems (particularly in design) that tools cannot detect.

    We have performed a self-assessment of our security, and it is documented in security.md. This considered the security requirements and security boundary, and examined the high-level architecture. We used static & dynamic tools, as well as human review (especially of the major design components). This was not an independent evaluation, but the criterion doesn't require that.


    Enough for a badge!

    Hardening mechanisms MUST be used in the software produced by the project so that software defects are less likely to result in security vulnerabilities. (URL required) [hardening]
    Hardening mechanisms may include HTTP headers like Content Security Policy (CSP), compiler flags to mitigate attacks (such as -fstack-protector), or compiler flags to eliminate undefined behavior. For our purposes least privilege is not considered a hardening mechanism (least privilege is important, but separate).

    We use various HTTP headers for hardening, including a rigorous Content Security Policy (CSP) setting. For more information, see security.md which discusses the hardening mechanisms.


 Analysis 2/2 ●

  • Dynamic code analysis


    Enough for a badge!

    The project MUST apply at least one dynamic analysis tool to any proposed major production release of the software produced by the project before its release. [dynamic_analysis]
    A dynamic analysis tool examines the software by executing it with specific inputs. For example, the project MAY use a fuzzing tool (e.g., American Fuzzy Lop) or a web application scanner (e.g., OWASP ZAP or w3af). In some cases the OSS-Fuzz project may be willing to apply fuzz testing to your project. For purposes of this criterion the dynamic analysis tool needs to vary the inputs in some way to look for various kinds of problems or be an automated test suite with at least 80% branch coverage. The Wikipedia page on dynamic analysis and the OWASP page on fuzzing identify some dynamic analysis tools. The analysis tool(s) MAY be focused on looking for security vulnerabilities, but this is not required.

    Analyzed with OWASP ZAP by Emily Ratliff


    Barely enough for a badge.

    The project SHOULD include many run-time assertions in the software it produces and check those assertions during dynamic analysis. [dynamic_analysis_enable_assertions]
    This criterion does not suggest enabling assertions during production; that is entirely up to the project and its users to decide. This criterion's focus is instead to improve fault detection during dynamic analysis before deployment. Enabling assertions in production use is completely different from enabling assertions during dynamic analysis (such as testing). In some cases enabling assertions in production use is extremely unwise (especially in high-integrity components). There are many arguments against enabling assertions in production, e.g., libraries should not crash callers, their presence may cause rejection by app stores, and/or activating an assertion in production may expose private data such as private keys. Beware that in many Linux distributions NDEBUG is not defined, so C/C++ assert() will by default be enabled for production in those environments. It may be important to use a different assertion mechanism or defining NDEBUG for production in those environments.

    Instead of embedding run-time assertions, there are many external tests with assertions that are checked during automated testing.



This data is available under the Creative Commons Attribution version 3.0 or later license (CC-BY-3.0+). All are free to share and adapt the data, but must give appropriate credit. Please credit David A. Wheeler and the OpenSSF Best Practices badge contributors.

Project badge entry owned by: David A. Wheeler.
Entry created on 2015-10-23 22:02:10 UTC, last updated on 2023-12-04 16:17:48 UTC. Last lost passing badge on 2023-09-19 06:10:11 UTC. Last achieved passing badge on 2023-09-19 06:10:30 UTC.

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