dependency-audit

What this skill does

Automatically detects the project type (Node.js, Python, Go, container) and runs the appropriate audit tool (npm audit, pip-audit, trivy). Aggregates discovered vulnerabilities by severity and outputs recommendations including fixed versions.

When to use

When checking dependency vulnerabilities before a code review or deployment
When setting up an automated dependency security gate in a CI/CD pipeline
When auditing accumulated vulnerabilities in an aging project all at once
When scanning container images or filesystems for vulnerabilities

Prerequisites

Node.js projects: npm installed (included with Node.js)
Python projects: pip-audit installed:
```
pip install pip-audit
```

Container/general use: trivy installed:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt-get install -y wget apt-transport-https gnupg
wget -qO - https://aquasecurity.github.io/trivy-repo/deb/public.key | sudo apt-key add -
echo "deb https://aquasecurity.github.io/trivy-repo/deb generic main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/trivy.list
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install -y trivy

Environment variable SECSKILL_PROJECT_PATH: project root path

Inputs

Variable	Required	Description
`SECSKILL_PROJECT_PATH`	Required	Project root path to audit
`SECSKILL_OUTPUT_DIR`	Optional	Directory to save results (default: `./output`)
`SECSKILL_MIN_SEVERITY`	Optional	Minimum severity filter `low/medium/high/critical` (default: `medium`)
`SECSKILL_TRIVY_TARGET`	Optional	trivy scan target (path or image name, default: project path)

Workflow

Step 1: Environment setup and project type detection

export PROJECT="${SECSKILL_PROJECT_PATH:?Set the SECSKILL_PROJECT_PATH environment variable}"
export OUTDIR="${SECSKILL_OUTPUT_DIR:-./output}"
export MIN_SEV="${SECSKILL_MIN_SEVERITY:-medium}"
mkdir -p "$OUTDIR"

if [ ! -d "$PROJECT" ]; then
  echo "[-] Path not found: $PROJECT"
  exit 1
fi

echo "[*] Detecting project type: $PROJECT"

HAS_NPM=false
HAS_PYTHON=false
HAS_GO=false

[ -f "$PROJECT/package.json" ] && HAS_NPM=true && echo "[+] Node.js project detected (package.json)"
[ -f "$PROJECT/package-lock.json" ] || [ -f "$PROJECT/yarn.lock" ] && HAS_NPM=true
[ -f "$PROJECT/requirements.txt" ] || [ -f "$PROJECT/Pipfile" ] || [ -f "$PROJECT/pyproject.toml" ] && HAS_PYTHON=true && echo "[+] Python project detected"
[ -f "$PROJECT/go.mod" ] && HAS_GO=true && echo "[+] Go project detected (go.mod)"

SUMMARY_FILE="$OUTDIR/dependency_audit_summary.txt"
echo "Dependency Audit Report" > "$SUMMARY_FILE"
echo "Path : $PROJECT" >> "$SUMMARY_FILE"
echo "Date : $(date -u '+%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')" >> "$SUMMARY_FILE"
echo "" >> "$SUMMARY_FILE"

Step 2: npm audit (Node.js)

if [ "$HAS_NPM" = "true" ]; then
  echo ""
  echo "[*] Running npm audit..."
  cd "$PROJECT"

  # Generate package-lock.json if missing
  if [ ! -f "package-lock.json" ] && [ ! -f "yarn.lock" ]; then
    echo "[*] Generating package-lock.json..."
    npm install --package-lock-only --silent 2>/dev/null
  fi

  npm audit \
    --audit-level="$MIN_SEV" \
    --json 2>/dev/null \
    > "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json"

  NPM_TOTAL=$(jq '.metadata.vulnerabilities | (.critical + .high + .moderate + .low)' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")
  NPM_CRITICAL=$(jq '.metadata.vulnerabilities.critical' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")
  NPM_HIGH=$(jq '.metadata.vulnerabilities.high' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")

  echo "[+] npm audit complete: $NPM_TOTAL total (critical: $NPM_CRITICAL, high: $NPM_HIGH)"

  cat >> "$SUMMARY_FILE" << EOF
[ Node.js (npm audit) ]
Total vulnerabilities : $NPM_TOTAL
  Critical : $NPM_CRITICAL
  High     : $NPM_HIGH
  Moderate : $(jq '.metadata.vulnerabilities.moderate' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")
  Low      : $(jq '.metadata.vulnerabilities.low' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")

Fixable items:
$(jq -r '.vulnerabilities | to_entries[] | select(.value.severity == "critical" or .value.severity == "high") | "  - \(.key): \(.value.severity) -> \(.value.fixAvailable // "manual fix required")"' "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" 2>/dev/null | head -10)

EOF
  cd - > /dev/null
fi

Step 3: pip-audit (Python)

if [ "$HAS_PYTHON" = "true" ]; then
  echo ""
  echo "[*] Running pip-audit..."

  PIP_AUDIT_ARGS=""
  if [ -f "$PROJECT/requirements.txt" ]; then
    PIP_AUDIT_ARGS="-r $PROJECT/requirements.txt"
  fi

  pip-audit \
    $PIP_AUDIT_ARGS \
    --format=json \
    --output="$OUTDIR/pip_audit.json" \
    2>/dev/null

  PIP_TOTAL=$(jq '[.[].vulns[]] | length' "$OUTDIR/pip_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")
  echo "[+] pip-audit complete: $PIP_TOTAL findings"

  cat >> "$SUMMARY_FILE" << EOF
[ Python (pip-audit) ]
Total vulnerabilities : $PIP_TOTAL

Findings:
$(jq -r '.[] | select(.vulns | length > 0) | "  - \(.name) \(.version): \(.vulns | length) issue(s) (\(.vulns[0].id // "?"))"' "$OUTDIR/pip_audit.json" 2>/dev/null | head -10)

EOF
fi

Step 4: trivy (Go and general)

if [ "$HAS_GO" = "true" ] || [ -f "$PROJECT/Dockerfile" ] || [ -f "$PROJECT/go.mod" ]; then
  echo ""
  echo "[*] Running trivy scan..."
  TRIVY_TARGET="${SECSKILL_TRIVY_TARGET:-$PROJECT}"

  if command -v trivy >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    trivy fs \
      --severity "$(echo $MIN_SEV | tr '[:lower:]' '[:upper:]'),HIGH,CRITICAL" \
      --format json \
      --output "$OUTDIR/trivy_audit.json" \
      --quiet \
      "$TRIVY_TARGET" 2>/dev/null

    TRIVY_TOTAL=$(jq '[.Results[]?.Vulnerabilities[]?] | length' "$OUTDIR/trivy_audit.json" 2>/dev/null || echo "0")
    echo "[+] trivy scan complete: $TRIVY_TOTAL findings"

    cat >> "$SUMMARY_FILE" << EOF
[ trivy (filesystem scan) ]
Total vulnerabilities : $TRIVY_TOTAL

Critical/High items:
$(jq -r '.Results[]?.Vulnerabilities[]? | select(.Severity == "CRITICAL" or .Severity == "HIGH") | "  - [\(.Severity)] \(.VulnerabilityID): \(.PkgName) \(.InstalledVersion) -> \(.FixedVersion // "no fix available")"' "$OUTDIR/trivy_audit.json" 2>/dev/null | head -15)

EOF
  else
    echo "[-] trivy not installed. Skipping Go audit."
  fi
fi

Step 5: Print overall summary

echo ""
echo "===== Dependency Audit Result Summary ====="
cat "$SUMMARY_FILE"
echo "==========================================="
echo "Detailed results:"
[ -f "$OUTDIR/npm_audit.json" ] && echo "  npm   : $OUTDIR/npm_audit.json"
[ -f "$OUTDIR/pip_audit.json" ] && echo "  pip   : $OUTDIR/pip_audit.json"
[ -f "$OUTDIR/trivy_audit.json" ] && echo "  trivy : $OUTDIR/trivy_audit.json"
echo "Summary : $SUMMARY_FILE"

Done when

The appropriate audit tool runs for each detected project type
Vulnerability counts are aggregated by severity
Summary file is created

Failure modes

Symptom	Cause	Resolution
`npm audit` fails	Missing package-lock.json	Run `npm install` first
pip-audit error	Virtual environment not activated	Run `source venv/bin/activate` then retry
trivy DB download slow	Network speed issue	Pre-download with `trivy image --download-db-only`
No tools detected	Unsupported project structure	Specify path explicitly with `SECSKILL_TRIVY_TARGET`

Notes

Use npm audit fix to automatically fix all auto-fixable vulnerabilities in bulk.
pip-audit includes pip install --upgrade <package> recommendations.
trivy scans OS packages, language-specific dependencies, and container images.
For CI/CD integration, configure a build gate that fails the build when critical vulnerabilities are found.