Safer Dependencies for Claude Code

When AI coding assistants like Claude add packages to your project, they often pick whatever version sounds right — without checking whether it has known security vulnerabilities, whether the package is still actively maintained, or whether the name is a typo away from a malicious lookalike.

safer-dependencies is a security layer for Claude Code: it sits between Claude and your manifest files and runs its security checks automatically: vulnerable installs are denied before they run, and a risky version written to a manifest is corrected on disk right after the write. It detects and fixes risky dependencies — CVEs, typosquats, abandoned packages, and version-age issues, plus a cooldown period on brand-new releases — across npm, PyPI, RubyGems, Maven, Go, Rust, and PHP (Composer). See CAPABILITIES.md for exactly what is and isn't covered.

New here? GETTING-STARTED.md takes you from zero to a working install in about five minutes.

Security & privacy: see SECURITY.md (vulnerability disclosure), PRIVACY.md (data egress, no telemetry), and CAPABILITIES.md (what the tool defends against and what it doesn't).

License (source-available — NOT OSI "open source"): Free to use and modify for your own purposes, including for-profit/company internal use and building products you sell. A separate paid license is required only to monetize the software itself — selling it, shipping it inside a product or service that is sold, or offering its functionality to third parties for a fee (including hosted/SaaS/API). Redistribution and derivatives must keep the license and credit this project. See LICENSE (Section 4 for the commercial restriction); commercial-license requests via github.com/robert-auger.

Getting started — zero to installed in about five minutes
What it does
What triggers it
What's in this repo
Supported ecosystems
Install
- Configuration
- Changing the cooldown period
Warning levels
How it works
Audit log
Requirements
FAQ

Getting started

GETTING-STARTED.md takes you from zero to a working install in about five minutes — prerequisites, the interactive install, and verification. For the full install reference (global/project/manual installs, Windows specifics, the permissions allowlist, updating, and uninstalling), see INSTALLATION.md.

Everyday use: once the hooks are installed, there's nothing to run — safer-dependencies works automatically in the background. As Claude adds or installs packages, it flags risky dependencies and upgrades vulnerable versions to a safe one in place — and blocks a known-vulnerable install before it even runs — so unsafe packages are caught and corrected without you having to ask. You can still invoke it directly any time: "is [email protected] safe?", "check safer-dependencies setup", or "show safer-dependencies stats".

What it does

When Claude is about to add a package to your project, safer-dependencies intercepts and runs 5 checks:

Provenance -- official registry, typosquat detection (npm/PyPI/RubyGems/Maven/crates.io), package age
Version age -- picks the newest stable version published 7+ days ago (cooldown window)
Vulnerability scan -- OSV API, with ecosystem-native tools (npm audit, pip-audit, bundle audit) when available
Hash-pin integrity -- for PyPI requirements.txt lines with --hash=sha256:... pins, the declared hash is validated against PyPI's published hashes; mismatch emits a WARNING
Abandoned & stale packages -- known-abandoned packages (e.g. paperclip, request, pycrypto, github.com/dgrijalva/jwt-go) are hard-blocked immediately with a suggested replacement; packages with no stable release in 2+ years get an advisory STALE: warning. Hard-blocked packages are removed from the manifest and Claude will ask how to proceed; stale-only packages are left in place.

If issues are found, Claude emits warnings and may step back to a safer version. All checks are logged to ~/.claude/safer-dependencies-audit-YYYY-MM.log (one file per calendar month).

What triggers it

The skill fires automatically when Claude:

Manifest / install operations

Adds or updates a package in package.json, requirements.txt, Gemfile, pom.xml, build.gradle, Cargo.toml, go.mod, or any other supported manifest
Writes an import, require, or use for a package not already declared in the manifest
Generates or updates a lock file (checks only new/changed entries)
Runs a package-manager install via Bash (npm install, bundle install, poetry install, uv sync, go mod tidy, etc.) — Pre-Install audits the command args, Post-Install audits the resulting lockfile
Writes a Dockerfile or CI workflow (.github/workflows/*.yml, etc.) that embeds pinned package-manager install steps

Selection & recommendation questions

Library/framework comparisons: "should I use axios or node-fetch?", "moment vs dayjs?", "which is better X or Y?"
Recommendation requests: "what's a good HTTP client for Python?", "recommend a logging library for Go", "what package handles CSV in Node?"
Version selection: "what version of Django should I use?", "latest stable Flask?"

Intent-to-use expressions (pre-add)

"I want to use FastAPI for this", "I'm thinking of adding Celery", "we're looking at Prisma as the ORM", "let's use Tailwind"

Package health and trust questions

"Is moment.js still maintained?", "is this gem still active?", "is X abandoned?", "is X EOL?", "can I trust this package?", "when was faker last updated?"

Scaffolding commands

npx create-react-app, npm create vite@latest, django-admin startproject, rails new, cargo new + cargo add, "bootstrap a new FastAPI project"

Implicit package adds (feature requests that imply a new dependency)

"Add Redis caching to the app", "connect to Postgres", "add JWT auth", "write code to send emails" — fires when no package for that capability is already in the manifest

Migration and porting

"Migrate from requests to httpx", "move from CRA to Vite", "port from moment to date-fns" — audits the incoming package

It does not fire for:

Standard library imports (os, fs, java.util.*, etc.)
Already-declared dependencies that aren't being changed
Academic discussion of how a package works internally ("explain React's reconciler", "how does webpack's module resolution work?") — comparison and selection questions do still fire

safer-dependencies v0.6.0