Cycode Cli

What is Cycode Cli about?

Cycode Cli provides a local command‑line interface that scans code repositories for hard‑coded secrets, IaC misconfigurations, vulnerable third‑party dependencies, and insecure code patterns. It integrates with Cycode’s cloud service to fetch policies, report findings, and optionally store results.

How to use Cycode Cli?

1. Install – pip3 install cycode or brew install cycode (on macOS) or download the binary from GitHub releases.
2. Authenticate – run cycode auth (opens a browser) or configure credentials with cycode configure or by setting CYCODE_CLIENT_ID and CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET environment variables.
3. Run scans – examples:
   • Repository scan: cycode scan repository /path/to/repo
   • Path scan: cycode scan path ./src
   • Commit‑history diff scan: cycode scan commit-history -r HEAD~1 ./repo
   • Pre‑commit hook: install the hook via the provided .pre-commit-config.yaml and run pre‑commit install.
4. View results – default output is a rich console table; use -o json for JSON, -o text for plain text, or --show-secret to reveal secret values.
5. Generate SBOM – cycode report sbom --format spdx-2.3 --include-vulnerabilities path ./project.

Key features of Cycode Cli

• Multi‑layer scanning: secrets, IaC, SCA (vulnerabilities & license compliance), SAST.
• Flexible scan scopes: whole repository, specific path, commit range, Terraform plan JSON, pre‑commit.
• Policy enforcement: severity thresholds, monitoring flag to push results to Cycode, custom remediation guidelines.
• Ignore rules: granular exclusions by value, SHA, path, rule ID, package, or CVE; stored locally in .cycode/config.yaml.
• MCP server: exposes scanning tools to AI assistants via Model Context Protocol.
• Integration hooks: pre‑commit hook, CI/CD ready with environment‑variable configuration.

Use cases of Cycode Cli

• Secure CI/CD pipelines – automatically fail builds on secret leaks or vulnerable dependencies.
• Developer day‑to‑day security – run cycode scan locally before committing code.
• Infrastructure audit – scan Terraform, CloudFormation, and other IaC files for misconfigurations.
• Open‑source dependency management – detect transitive vulnerabilities and license issues.
• AI‑assisted code review – connect the MCP server to LLMs (e.g., Cursor, Claude) to query scanning capabilities programmatically.

FAQ about Cycode Cli

Q: Which Python version is required? A: Python 3.9 or later (MCP command needs 3.10+).

Q: Do I need an internet connection? A: Yes for authentication and policy updates; scans run locally but results are sent to the Cycode service.

Q: How can I hide secret values in the output? A: Secrets are obfuscated by default; use --show-secret to reveal them if needed.

Q: Can I run the tool without installing globally? A: Yes – use pip install --user cycode or run the binary directly after downloading from GitHub releases.

Q: How do I configure the MCP server for AI tools? A: Start the server with cycode mcp (or via the JSON config shown in serverConfig). Provide your client ID/secret through environment variables.

Q: What formats are supported for SBOM reports? A: SPDX 2.2, SPDX 2.3, and CycloneDX 1.4.

Cycode CLI User Guide

The Cycode Command Line Interface (CLI) is an application you can install locally to scan your repositories for secrets, infrastructure as code misconfigurations, software composition analysis vulnerabilities, and static application security testing issues.

This guide walks you through both installation and usage.

Table of Contents

1. Prerequisites
2. Installation
   1. Install Cycode CLI
      1. Using the Auth Command
      2. Using the Configure Command
      3. Add to Environment Variables
         1. On Unix/Linux
         2. On Windows
   2. Install Pre-Commit Hook
3. Cycode CLI Commands
4. MCP Command
   1. Starting the MCP Server
   2. Available Options
   3. MCP Tools
   4. Usage Examples
5. Scan Command
   1. Running a Scan
      1. Options
         1. Severity Threshold
         2. Monitor
         3. Cycode Report
         4. Package Vulnerabilities
         5. License Compliance
         6. Lock Restore
      2. Repository Scan
         1. Branch Option
      3. Path Scan
         1. Terraform Plan Scan
      4. Commit History Scan
         1. Commit Range Option (Diff Scanning)
      5. Pre-Commit Scan
   2. Scan Results
      1. Show/Hide Secrets
      2. Soft Fail
      3. Example Scan Results
         1. Secrets Result Example
         2. IaC Result Example
         3. SCA Result Example
         4. SAST Result Example
      4. Company Custom Remediation Guidelines
   3. Ignoring Scan Results
      1. Ignoring a Secret Value
      2. Ignoring a Secret SHA Value
      3. Ignoring a Path
      4. Ignoring a Secret, IaC, or SCA Rule
      5. Ignoring a Package
      6. Ignoring via a config file
6. Report command
   1. Generating SBOM Report
7. Scan logs
8. Syntax Help

Prerequisites

• The Cycode CLI application requires Python version 3.9 or later.
• Use the cycode auth command to authenticate to Cycode with the CLI
  • Alternatively, you can get a Cycode Client ID and Client Secret Key by following the steps detailed in the Service Account Token and Personal Access Token pages, which contain details on getting these values.

Installation

The following installation steps are applicable to both Windows and UNIX / Linux operating systems.

[!NOTE] The following steps assume the use of python3 and pip3 for Python-related commands; however, some systems may instead use the python and pip commands, depending on your Python environment’s configuration.

Install Cycode CLI

To install the Cycode CLI application on your local machine, perform the following steps:

1. Open your command line or terminal application.

2. Execute one of the following commands:

   • To install from PyPI:

     pip3 install cycode
     

   • To install from Homebrew:

     brew install cycode
     

   • To install from GitHub Releases navigate and download executable for your operating system and architecture, then run the following command:

   cd /path/to/downloaded/cycode-cli
   chmod +x cycode
   ./cycode
   

3. Finally authenticate the CLI. There are three methods to set the Cycode client ID and client secret:

   • cycode auth (Recommended)
   • cycode configure
   • Add them to your environment variables

Using the Auth Command

[!NOTE] This is the recommended method for setting up your local machine to authenticate with Cycode CLI.

1. Type the following command into your terminal/command line window:

   cycode auth

2. A browser window will appear, asking you to log into Cycode (as seen below):

3. Enter your login credentials on this page and log in.

4. You will eventually be taken to the page below, where you'll be asked to choose the business group you want to authorize Cycode with (if applicable):

   [!NOTE] This will be the default method for authenticating with the Cycode CLI.

5. Click the Allow button to authorize the Cycode CLI on the selected business group.

6. Once completed, you'll see the following screen if it was selected successfully:

7. In the terminal/command line screen, you will see the following when exiting the browser window:

   Successfully logged into cycode

Using the Configure Command

[!NOTE] If you already set up your Cycode Client ID and Client Secret through the Linux or Windows environment variables, those credentials will take precedent over this method.

1. Type the following command into your terminal/command line window:

   cycode configure
   

2. Enter your Cycode API URL value (you can leave blank to use default value).

   Cycode API URL [https://api.cycode.com]: https://api.onpremise.com

3. Enter your Cycode APP URL value (you can leave blank to use default value).

   Cycode APP URL [https://app.cycode.com]: https://app.onpremise.com

4. Enter your Cycode Client ID value.

   Cycode Client ID []: 7fe5346b-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-55157625c72d

5. Enter your Cycode Client Secret value.

   Cycode Client Secret []: c1e24929-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-8b08c1839a2e

6. If the values were entered successfully, you'll see the following message:

   Successfully configured CLI credentials!

   or/and

   Successfully configured Cycode URLs!

If you go into the .cycode folder under your user folder, you'll find these credentials were created and placed in the credentials.yaml file in that folder. The URLs were placed in the config.yaml file in that folder.

Add to Environment Variables

On Unix/Linux:

export CYCODE_CLIENT_ID={your Cycode ID}

and

export CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET={your Cycode Secret Key}

On Windows

1. From the Control Panel, navigate to the System menu:

2. Next, click Advanced system settings:

3. In the System Properties window that opens, click the Environment Variables button:

4. Create CYCODE_CLIENT_ID and CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET variables with values matching your ID and Secret Key, respectively:

5. Insert the cycode.exe into the path to complete the installation.

Install Pre-Commit Hook

Cycode’s pre-commit hook can be set up within your local repository so that the Cycode CLI application will identify any issues with your code automatically before you commit it to your codebase.

[!NOTE] pre-commit hook is not available for IaC scans.

Perform the following steps to install the pre-commit hook:

1. Install the pre-commit framework (Python 3.9 or higher must be installed):

   pip3 install pre-commit
   

2. Navigate to the top directory of the local Git repository you wish to configure.

3. Create a new YAML file named .pre-commit-config.yaml (include the beginning .) in the repository’s top directory that contains the following:

   repos:
     - repo: https://github.com/cycodehq/cycode-cli
       rev: v3.2.0
       hooks:
         - id: cycode
           stages:
             - pre-commit
   

4. Modify the created file for your specific needs. Use hook ID cycode to enable scan for Secrets. Use hook ID cycode-sca to enable SCA scan. Use hook ID cycode-sast to enable SAST scan. If you want to enable all scanning types, use this configuration:

   repos:
     - repo: https://github.com/cycodehq/cycode-cli
       rev: v3.2.0
       hooks:
         - id: cycode
           stages:
             - pre-commit
         - id: cycode-sca
           stages:
             - pre-commit
         - id: cycode-sast
           stages:
             - pre-commit
   

5. Install Cycode’s hook:

   pre-commit install
   

   A successful hook installation will result in the message: Pre-commit installed at .git/hooks/pre-commit.

6. Keep the pre-commit hook up to date:

   pre-commit autoupdate
   

   It will automatically bump rev in .pre-commit-config.yaml to the latest available version of Cycode CLI.

[!NOTE] Trigger happens on git commit command. Hook triggers only on the files that are staged for commit.

Cycode CLI Commands

The following are the options and commands available with the Cycode CLI application:

Option	Description
-v, --verbose	Show detailed logs.
--no-progress-meter	Do not show the progress meter.
--no-update-notifier	Do not check CLI for updates.
-o, --output [rich|text|json|table]	Specify the output type. The default is rich.
--client-id TEXT	Specify a Cycode client ID for this specific scan execution.
--client-secret TEXT	Specify a Cycode client secret for this specific scan execution.
--install-completion	Install completion for the current shell..
--show-completion [bash|zsh|fish|powershell|pwsh]	Show completion for the specified shell, to copy it or customize the installation.
-h, --help	Show options for given command.

Command	Description
auth	Authenticate your machine to associate the CLI with your Cycode account.
configure	Initial command to configure your CLI client authentication.
ignore	Ignore a specific value, path or rule ID.
mcp	Start the Model Context Protocol (MCP) server to enable AI integration with Cycode scanning capabilities.
scan	Scan the content for Secrets/IaC/SCA/SAST violations. You`ll need to specify which scan type to perform: commit-history/path/repository/etc.
report	Generate report. You will need to specify which report type to perform as SBOM.
status	Show the CLI status and exit.

MCP Command [EXPERIMENT]

[!WARNING] The MCP command is available only for Python 3.10 and above. If you're using an earlier Python version, this command will not be available.

The Model Context Protocol (MCP) command allows you to start an MCP server that exposes Cycode's scanning capabilities to AI systems and applications. This enables AI models to interact with Cycode CLI tools via a standardized protocol.

[!TIP] For the best experience, install Cycode CLI globally on your system using pip install cycode or brew install cycode, then authenticate once with cycode auth. After global installation and authentication, you won't need to configure CYCODE_CLIENT_ID and CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET environment variables in your MCP configuration files.

Starting the MCP Server

To start the MCP server, use the following command:

cycode mcp

By default, this starts the server using the stdio transport, which is suitable for local integrations and AI applications that can spawn subprocesses.

Available Options

Option	Description
-t, --transport	Transport type for the MCP server: stdio, sse, or streamable-http (default: stdio)
-H, --host	Host address to bind the server (used only for non stdio transport) (default: 127.0.0.1)
-p, --port	Port number to bind the server (used only for non stdio transport) (default: 8000)
--help	Show help message and available options

MCP Tools

The MCP server provides the following tools that AI systems can use:

Tool Name	Description
cycode_secret_scan	Scan files for hardcoded secrets
cycode_sca_scan	Scan files for Software Composition Analysis (SCA) - vulnerabilities and license issues
cycode_iac_scan	Scan files for Infrastructure as Code (IaC) misconfigurations
cycode_sast_scan	Scan files for Static Application Security Testing (SAST) - code quality and security flaws
cycode_status	Get Cycode CLI version, authentication status, and configuration information

Usage Examples

Basic Command Examples

Start the MCP server with default settings (stdio transport):

cycode mcp

Start the MCP server with explicit stdio transport:

cycode mcp -t stdio

Start the MCP server with Server-Sent Events (SSE) transport:

cycode mcp -t sse -p 8080

Start the MCP server with streamable HTTP transport on custom host and port:

cycode mcp -t streamable-http -H 0.0.0.0 -p 9000

Learn more about MCP Transport types in the MCP Protocol Specification – Transports.

Configuration Examples

Using MCP with Cursor/VS Code/Claude Desktop/etc (mcp.json)

[!NOTE] For EU Cycode environments, make sure to set the appropriate CYCODE_API_URL and CYCODE_APP_URL values in the environment variables (e.g., https://api.eu.cycode.com and https://app.eu.cycode.com).

Follow this guide to configure the MCP server in your VS Code/GitHub Copilot. Keep in mind that in settings.json, there is an mcp object containing a nested servers sub-object, rather than a standalone mcpServers object.

For stdio transport (direct execution):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "command": "cycode",
      "args": ["mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_ID": "your-cycode-id",
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET": "your-cycode-secret-key",
        "CYCODE_API_URL": "https://api.cycode.com",
        "CYCODE_APP_URL": "https://app.cycode.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

For stdio transport with pipx installation:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "command": "pipx",
      "args": ["run", "cycode", "mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_ID": "your-cycode-id",
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET": "your-cycode-secret-key",
        "CYCODE_API_URL": "https://api.cycode.com",
        "CYCODE_APP_URL": "https://app.cycode.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

For stdio transport with uvx installation:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["cycode", "mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_ID": "your-cycode-id",
        "CYCODE_CLIENT_SECRET": "your-cycode-secret-key",
        "CYCODE_API_URL": "https://api.cycode.com",
        "CYCODE_APP_URL": "https://app.cycode.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

For SSE transport (Server-Sent Events):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "url": "http://127.0.0.1:8000/sse"
    }
  }
}

For SSE transport on custom port:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "url": "http://127.0.0.1:8080/sse"
    }
  }
}

For streamable HTTP transport:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "url": "http://127.0.0.1:8000/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Running MCP Server in Background

For SSE transport (start server first, then configure client):

# Start the MCP server in the background
cycode mcp -t sse -p 8000 &

# Configure in mcp.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "url": "http://127.0.0.1:8000/sse"
    }
  }
}

For streamable HTTP transport:

# Start the MCP server in the background
cycode mcp -t streamable-http -H 127.0.0.2 -p 9000 &

# Configure in mcp.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cycode": {
      "url": "http://127.0.0.2:9000/mcp"
    }
  }
}

[!NOTE] The MCP server requires proper Cycode CLI authentication to function. Make sure you have authenticated using cycode auth or configured your credentials before starting the MCP server.

Troubleshooting MCP

If you encounter issues with the MCP server, you can enable debug logging to get more detailed information about what's happening. There are two ways to enable debug logging:

1. Using the -v or --verbose flag:

cycode -v mcp

2. Using the CYCODE_CLI_VERBOSE environment variable:

CYCODE_CLI_VERBOSE=1 cycode mcp

The debug logs will show detailed information about:

• Server startup and configuration
• Connection attempts and status
• Tool execution and results
• Any errors or warnings that occur

This information can be helpful when:

• Diagnosing connection issues
• Understanding why certain tools aren't working
• Identifying authentication problems
• Debugging transport-specific issues

Scan Command

Running a Scan

The Cycode CLI application offers several types of scans so that you can choose the option that best fits your case. The following are the current options and commands available:

Option	Description
-t, --scan-type [secret|iac|sca|sast]	Specify the scan you wish to execute (secret/iac/sca/sast), the default is secret.
--show-secret BOOLEAN	Show secrets in plain text. See Show/Hide Secrets section for more details.
--soft-fail BOOLEAN	Run scan without failing, always return a non-error status code. See Soft Fail section for more details.
--severity-threshold [INFO|LOW|MEDIUM|HIGH|CRITICAL]	Show only violations at the specified level or higher.
--sca-scan	Specify the SCA scan you wish to execute (package-vulnerabilities/license-compliance). The default is both.
--monitor	When specified, the scan results will be recorded in Cycode.
--cycode-report	Display a link to the scan report in the Cycode platform in the console output.
--no-restore	When specified, Cycode will not run the restore command. This will scan direct dependencies ONLY!
--gradle-all-sub-projects	Run gradle restore command for all sub projects. This should be run from
--maven-settings-file	For Maven only, allows using a custom settings.xml file when scanning for dependencies
--help	Show options for given command.

Command	Description
commit-history	Scan commit history or perform diff scanning between specific commits
path	Scan the files in the path supplied in the command
pre-commit	Use this command to scan the content that was not committed yet
repository	Scan git repository including its history

Options

Severity Option

To limit the results of the scan to a specific severity threshold, the argument --severity-threshold can be added to the scan command.

For example, the following command will scan the repository for policy violations that have severity of Medium or higher:

cycode scan --severity-threshold MEDIUM repository ~/home/git/codebase

Monitor Option

[!NOTE] This option is only available to SCA scans.

To push scan results tied to the SCA policies found in an SCA type scan to Cycode, add the argument --monitor to the scan command.

For example, the following command will scan the repository for SCA policy violations and push them to Cycode platform:

cycode scan -t sca --monitor repository ~/home/git/codebase

Cycode Report Option

For every scan performed using the Cycode CLI, a report is automatically generated and its results are sent to Cycode. These results are tied to the relevant policies (e.g., SCA policies for Repository scans) within the Cycode platform.

To have the direct URL to this Cycode report printed in your CLI output after the scan completes, add the argument --cycode-report to your scan command.

cycode scan --cycode-report repository ~/home/git/codebase

All scan results from the CLI will appear in the CLI Logs section of Cycode. If you included the --cycode-report flag in your command, a direct link to the specific report will be displayed in your terminal following the scan results.

[!WARNING] You must have the owner or admin role in Cycode to view this page.

The report page will look something like below:

Package Vulnerabilities Option

[!NOTE] This option is only available to SCA scans.

To scan a specific package vulnerability of your local repository, add the argument --sca-scan package-vulnerabilities following the -t sca or --scan-type sca option.

In the previous example, if you wanted to only run an SCA scan on package vulnerabilities, you could execute the following:

cycode scan -t sca --sca-scan package-vulnerabilities repository ~/home/git/codebase

License Compliance Option

[!NOTE] This option is only available to SCA scans.

To scan a specific branch of your local repository, add the argument --sca-scan license-compliance followed by the name of the branch you wish to scan.

In the previous example, if you wanted to only scan a branch named dev, you could execute the following:

cycode scan -t sca --sca-scan license-compliance repository ~/home/git/codebase -b dev

Lock Restore Option

[!NOTE] This option is only available to SCA scans.

We use the sbt-dependency-lock plugin to restore the lock file for SBT projects. To disable lock restore in use --no-restore option.

Prerequisites:

• sbt-dependency-lock plugin: Install the plugin by adding the following line to project/plugins.sbt:

  addSbtPlugin("software.purpledragon" % "sbt-dependency-lock" % "1.5.1")
  

Repository Scan

A repository scan examines an entire local repository for any exposed secrets or insecure misconfigurations. This more holistic scan type looks at everything: the current state of your repository and its commit history. It will look not only for secrets that are currently exposed within the repository but previously deleted secrets as well.

To execute a full repository scan, execute the following:

cycode scan repository {{path}}

For example, if you wanted to scan a repository stored in ~/home/git/codebase, you could execute the following:

cycode scan repository ~/home/git/codebase

The following option is available for use with this command:

Option	Description
-b, --branch TEXT	Branch to scan, if not set scanning the default branch

Branch Option

To scan a specific branch of your local repository, add the argument -b (alternatively, --branch) followed by the name of the branch you wish to scan.

Given the previous example, if you wanted to only scan a branch named dev, you could execute the following:

cycode scan repository ~/home/git/codebase -b dev

Path Scan

A path scan examines a specific local directory and all the contents within it, instead of focusing solely on a GIT repository.

To execute a directory scan, execute the following:

cycode scan path {{path}}

For example, consider a scenario in which you want to scan the directory located at ~/home/git/codebase. You could then execute the following:

cycode scan path ~/home/git/codebase

Terraform Plan Scan

Cycode CLI supports Terraform plan scanning (supporting Terraform 0.12 and later)

Terraform plan file must be in JSON format (having .json extension)

If you just have a configuration file, you can generate a plan by doing the following:

1. Initialize a working directory that contains Terraform configuration file:

   terraform init

2. Create Terraform execution plan and save the binary output:

   terraform plan -out={tfplan_output}

3. Convert the binary output file into readable JSON:

   terraform show -json {tfplan_output} > {tfplan}.json

4. Scan your {tfplan}.json with Cycode CLI:

   cycode scan -t iac path ~/PATH/TO/YOUR/{tfplan}.json

Commit History Scan

[!NOTE] Commit History Scan is not available for IaC scans.

The commit history scan command provides two main capabilities:

1. Full History Scanning: Analyze all commits in the repository history
2. Diff Scanning: Scan only the changes between specific commits

Secrets scanning can analyze all commits in the repository history because secrets introduced and later removed can still be leaked or exposed. For SCA and SAST scans, the commit history command focuses on scanning the differences/changes between commits, making it perfect for pull request reviews and incremental scanning.

A commit history scan examines your Git repository's commit history and can be used both for comprehensive historical analysis and targeted diff scanning of specific changes.

To execute a commit history scan, execute the following:

cycode scan commit-history {{path}}

For example, consider a scenario in which you want to scan the commit history for a repository stored in ~/home/git/codebase. You could then execute the following:

cycode scan commit-history ~/home/git/codebase

The following options are available for use with this command:

Option	Description
-r, --commit-range TEXT	Scan a commit range in this git repository, by default cycode scans all commit history (example: HEAD~1)

Commit Range Option (Diff Scanning)

The commit range option enables diff scanning – scanning only the changes between specific commits instead of the entire repository history. This is particularly useful for:

• Pull request validation: Scan only the changes introduced in a PR
• Incremental CI/CD scanning: Focus on recent changes rather than the entire codebase
• Feature branch review: Compare changes against main/master branch
• Performance optimization: Faster scans by limiting scope to relevant changes

Commit Range Syntax

The --commit-range (-r) option supports standard Git revision syntax:

Syntax	Description	Example
commit1..commit2	Changes from commit1 to commit2	abc123..def456
commit1...commit2	Changes in commit2 not in commit1	main...feature-branch
commit	Changes from commit to HEAD	HEAD~1
branch1..branch2	Changes from branch1 to branch2	main..feature-branch

Diff Scanning Examples

Scan changes in the last commit:

cycode scan commit-history -r HEAD~1 ~/home/git/codebase

Scan changes between two specific commits:

cycode scan commit-history -r abc123..def456 ~/home/git/codebase

Scan changes in your feature branch compared to main:

cycode scan commit-history -r main..HEAD ~/home/git/codebase

Scan changes between main and a feature branch:

cycode scan commit-history -r main..feature-branch ~/home/git/codebase

Scan all changes in the last 3 commits:

cycode scan commit-history -r HEAD~3..HEAD ~/home/git/codebase

[!TIP] For CI/CD pipelines, you can use environment variables like ${{ github.event.pull_request.base.sha }}..${{ github.sha }} (GitHub Actions) or $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_SHA..$CI_COMMIT_SHA (GitLab CI) to scan only PR/MR changes.

Pre-Commit Scan

A pre-commit scan automatically identifies any issues before you commit changes to your repository. There is no need to manually execute this scan; configure the pre-commit hook as detailed under the Installation section of this guide.

After installing the pre-commit hook, you may occasionally wish to skip scanning during a specific commit. To do this, add the following to your git command to skip scanning for a single commit:

SKIP=cycode git commit -m <your commit message>`

Scan Results

Each scan will complete with a message stating if any issues were found or not.

If no issues are found, the scan ends with the following success message:

Good job! No issues were found!!! 👏👏👏

If an issue is found, a violation card appears upon completion instead. In this case you should review the file in question for the specific line highlighted by the result message. Implement any changes required to resolve the issue, then execute the scan again.

Show/Hide Secrets

In the examples below, a secret was found in the file secret_test, located in the subfolder cli. The second part of the message shows the specific line the secret appears in, which in this case is a value assigned to googleApiKey.

Note how the example obscures the actual secret value, replacing most of the secret with asterisks. Scans obscure secrets by default, but you may optionally disable this feature to view the full secret (assuming the machine you are viewing the scan result on is sufficiently secure from prying eyes).

To disable secret obfuscation, add the --show-secret argument to any type of scan.

In the following example, a Path Scan is executed against the cli subdirectory with the option enabled to display any secrets found in full:

cycode scan --show-secret path ./cli

The result would then not be obfuscated.

Soft Fail

In normal operation the CLI will return an exit code of 1 when issues are found in the scan results. Depending on your CI/CD setup this will usually result in an overall failure. If you don't want this to happen, you can use the soft fail feature.

By adding the --soft-fail option to any type of scan, the exit code will be forced to 0 regardless of whether any results are found.

Example Scan Results

Secrets Result Example

╭─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Hardcoded generic-password is used ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│                                                                                                                                               Violation 12 of 12 │
│ ╭─ 🔍 Details ───────────────────────────────────────╮ ╭─ 💻 Code Snippet ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │  Severity    🟠 MEDIUM                             │ │   34 };                                                                                               │ │
│ │  In file     /Users/cycodemacuser/NodeGoat/test/s  │ │   35                                                                                                  │ │
│ │              ecurity/profile-test.js               │ │   36 var sutUserName = "user1";                                                                       │ │
│ │  Secret SHA  b4ea3116d868b7c982ee6812cce61727856b  │ │ ❱ 37 var sutUserPassword = "Us*****23";                                                               │ │
│ │              802b3063cd5aebe7d796988552e0          │ │   38                                                                                                  │ │
│ │  Rule ID     68b6a876-4890-4e62-9531-0e687223579f  │ │   39 chrome.setDefaultService(service);                                                               │ │
│ ╰────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │   40                                                                                                  │ │
│                                                        ╰───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
│ ╭─ 📝 Summary ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │ A generic secret or password is an authentication token used to access a computer or application and is assigned to a password variable.                     │ │
│ ╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

IaC Result Example

╭──────────── Enable Content Encoding through the attribute 'MinimumCompressionSize'. This value should be greater than -1 and smaller than 10485760. ─────────────╮
│                                                                                                                                              Violation 45 of 110 │
│ ╭─ 🔍 Details ───────────────────────────────────────╮ ╭─ 💻 Code Snippet ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │  Severity      🟠 MEDIUM                           │ │   20 BinaryMediaTypes:                                                                                │ │
│ │  In file       ...ads-copy/iac/cft/api-gateway/ap  │ │   21   - !Ref binaryMediaType1                                                                        │ │
│ │                i-gateway-rest-api/deploy.yml       │ │   22   - !Ref binaryMediaType2                                                                        │ │
│ │  IaC Provider  CloudFormation                      │ │ ❱ 23 MinimumCompressionSize: -1                                                                       │ │
│ │  Rule ID       33c4b90c-3270-4337-a075-d3109c141b  │ │   24 EndpointConfiguration:                                                                           │ │
│ │                53                                  │ │   25   Types:                                                                                         │ │
│ ╰────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │   26     - EDGE                                                                                       │ │
│                                                        ╰───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
│ ╭─ 📝 Summary ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │ This policy validates the proper configuration of content encoding in AWS API Gateway. Specifically, the policy checks for the attribute                     │ │
│ │ 'minimum_compression_size' in API Gateway REST APIs. Correct configuration of this attribute is important for enabling content encoding of API responses for │ │
│ │ improved API performance and reduced payload sizes.                                                                                                          │ │
│ ╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

SCA Result Example

╭─────────────────────────────────────────────────────── [CVE-2019-10795] Prototype Pollution in undefsafe ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│                                                                                                                                             Violation 172 of 195 │
│ ╭─ 🔍 Details ───────────────────────────────────────╮ ╭─ 💻 Code Snippet ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │  Severity               🟠 MEDIUM                  │ │   26758   "integrity": "sha1-5z3T17DXxe2G+6xrCufYxqadUPo=",                                           │ │
│ │  In file                /Users/cycodemacuser/Node  │ │   26759   "dev": true                                                                                 │ │
│ │                         Goat/package-lock.json     │ │   26760 },                                                                                            │ │
│ │  CVEs                   CVE-2019-10795             │ │ ❱ 26761 "undefsafe": {                                                                                │ │
│ │  Package                undefsafe                  │ │   26762   "version": "2.0.2",                                                                         │ │
│ │  Version                2.0.2                      │ │   26763   "resolved": "https://registry.npmjs.org/undefsafe/-/undefsafe-2.0.2.tgz",                   │ │
│ │  First patched version  Not fixed                  │ │   26764   "integrity": "sha1-Il9rngM3Zj4Njnz9aG/Cg2zKznY=",                                           │ │
│ │  Dependency path        nodemon 1.19.1 ->          │ ╰───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
│ │                         undefsafe 2.0.2            │                                                                                                           │
│ │  Rule ID                9c6a8911-e071-4616-86db-4  │                                                                                                           │
│ │                         943f2e1df81                │                                                                                                           │
│ ╰────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯                                                                                                           │
│ ╭─ 📝 Summary ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │ undefsafe before 2.0.3 is vulnerable to Prototype Pollution. The 'a' function could be tricked into adding or modifying properties of Object.prototype using │ │
│ │ a __proto__ payload.                                                                                                                                         │ │
│ ╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

SAST Result Example

╭───────────────────────────────────────────── [CWE-208: Observable Timing Discrepancy] Observable Timing Discrepancy ─────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│                                                                                                                                               Violation 24 of 49 │
│ ╭─ 🔍 Details ───────────────────────────────────────╮ ╭─ 💻 Code Snippet ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │  Severity       🟠 MEDIUM                          │ │   173         " including numbers, lowercase and uppercase letters.";                                 │ │
│ │  In file        /Users/cycodemacuser/NodeGoat/app  │ │   174     return false;                                                                               │ │
│ │                 /routes/session.js                 │ │   175 }                                                                                               │ │
│ │  CWE            CWE-208                            │ │ ❱ 176 if (password !== verify) {                                                                      │ │
│ │  Subcategory    Security                           │ │   177     errors.verifyError = "Password must match";                                                 │ │
│ │  Language       js                                 │ │   178     return false;                                                                               │ │
│ │  Security Tool  Bearer (Powered by Cycode)         │ │   179 }                                                                                               │ │
│ │  Rule ID        19fbca07-a8e7-4fa6-92ac-a36d15509  │ ╰───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
│ │                 fa9                                │                                                                                                           │
│ ╰────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯                                                                                                           │
│ ╭─ 📝 Summary ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │
│ │ Observable Timing Discrepancy occurs when the time it takes for certain operations to complete can be measured and observed by attackers. This vulnerability │ │
│ │ is particularly concerning when operations involve sensitive information, such as password checks or secret comparisons. If attackers can analyze how long   │ │
│ │ these operations take, they might be able to deduce confidential details, putting your data at risk.                                                         │ │
│ ╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ │
╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

Company Custom Remediation Guidelines

If your company has set custom remediation guidelines in the relevant policy via the Cycode portal, you'll see a field for “Company Guidelines” that contains the remediation guidelines you added. Note that if you haven't added any company guidelines, this field will not appear in the CLI tool.

Ignoring Scan Results

Ignore rules can be added to ignore specific secret values, specific SHA512 values, specific paths, and specific Cycode secret and IaC rule IDs. This will cause the scan to not alert these values. The ignoring rules are written and saved locally in the ./.cycode/config.yaml file.

[!WARNING] Adding values to be ignored should be done with careful consideration of the values, paths, and policies to ensure that the scans will pick up true positives.

The following are the options available for the cycode ignore command:

Option	Description
--by-value TEXT	Ignore a specific value while scanning for secrets. See Ignoring a Secret Value for more details.
--by-sha TEXT	Ignore a specific SHA512 representation of a string while scanning for secrets. See Ignoring a Secret SHA Value for more details.
--by-path TEXT	Avoid scanning a specific path. Need to specify scan type. See Ignoring a Path for more details.
--by-rule TEXT	Ignore scanning a specific secret rule ID/IaC rule ID/SCA rule ID. See Ignoring a Secret or Iac Rule for more details.
--by-package TEXT	Ignore scanning a specific package version while running an SCA scan. Expected pattern - name@version. See Ignoring a Package for more details.
--by-cve TEXT	Ignore scanning a specific CVE while running an SCA scan. Expected pattern: CVE-YYYY-NNN.
-t, --scan-type [secret|iac|sca|sast]	Specify the scan you wish to execute (secret/iac/sca/sast). The default value is secret.
-g, --global	Add an ignore rule and update it in the global .cycode config file.

Ignoring a Secret Value

To ignore a specific secret value, you will need to use the --by-value flag. This will ignore the given secret value from all future scans. Use the following command to add a secret value to be ignored:

cycode ignore --by-value {{secret-value}}

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore a specific secret value is as follows:

cycode ignore --by-value h3110w0r1d!@#$350

In the example above, replace the h3110w0r1d!@#$350 value with your non-masked secret value. See the Cycode scan options for details on how to see secret values in the scan results.

Ignoring a Secret SHA Value

To ignore a specific secret SHA value, you will need to use the --by-sha flag. This will ignore the given secret SHA value from all future scans. Use the following command to add a secret SHA value to be ignored:

cycode ignore --by-sha {{secret-sha-value}}

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore a specific secret SHA value is as follows:

cycode ignore --by-sha a44081db3296c84b82d12a35c446a3cba19411dddfa0380134c75f7b3973bff0

In the example above, replace the a44081db3296c84b82d12a35c446a3cba19411dddfa0380134c75f7b3973bff0 value with your secret SHA value.

Ignoring a Path

To ignore a specific path for either secret, IaC, or SCA scans, you will need to use the --by-path flag in conjunction with the -t, --scan-type flag (you must specify the scan type). This will ignore the given path from all future scans for the given scan type. Use the following command to add a path to be ignored:

cycode ignore -t {{scan-type}} --by-path {{path}}

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore a specific path for a secret is as follows:

cycode ignore -t secret --by-path ~/home/my-repo/config

In the example above, replace the ~/home/my-repo/config value with your path value.

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore a specific path from IaC scans is as follows:

cycode ignore -t iac --by-path ~/home/my-repo/config

In the example above, replace the ~/home/my-repo/config value with your path value.

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore a specific path from SCA scans is as follows:

cycode ignore -t sca --by-path ~/home/my-repo/config

In the example above, replace the ~/home/my-repo/config value with your path value.

Ignoring a Secret, IaC, SCA, or SAST Rule

To ignore a specific secret, IaC, SCA, or SAST rule, you will need to use the --by-rule flag in conjunction with the -t, --scan-type flag (you must specify the scan type). This will ignore the given rule ID value from all future scans. Use the following command to add a rule ID value to be ignored:

cycode ignore -t {{scan-type}} --by-rule {{rule-ID}}

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore the specific secret rule ID is as follows:

cycode ignore -t secret --by-rule ce3a4de0-9dfc-448b-a004-c538cf8b4710

In the example above, replace the ce3a4de0-9dfc-448b-a004-c538cf8b4710 value with the rule ID you want to ignore.

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore the specific IaC rule ID is as follows:

cycode ignore -t iac --by-rule bdaa88e2-5e7c-46ff-ac2a-29721418c59c

In the example above, replace the bdaa88e2-5e7c-46ff-ac2a-29721418c59c value with the rule ID you want to ignore.

In the example at the top of this section, the command to ignore the specific SCA rule ID is as follows:

cycode ignore -t sca --by-rule dc21bc6b-9f4f-46fb-9f92-e4327ea03f6b

In the example above, replace the dc21bc6b-9f4f-46fb-9f92-e4327ea03f6b value with the rule ID you want to ignore.

Ignoring a Package

[!NOTE] This option is only available to the SCA scans.

To ignore a specific package in the SCA scans, you will need to use the --by-package flag in conjunction with the -t, --scan-type flag (you must specify the sca scan type). This will ignore the given package, using the {{package_name}}@{{package_version}} formatting, from all future scans. Use the following command to add a package and version to be ignored:

cycode ignore --scan-type sca --by-package {{package_name}}@{{package_version}}

OR

cycode ignore -t sca --by-package {{package_name}}@{{package_version}}

In the example below, the command to ignore a specific SCA package is as follows:

cycode ignore --scan-type sca --by-package pyyaml@5.3.1

In the example above, replace pyyaml with package name and 5.3.1 with the package version you want to ignore.

Ignoring via a config file

The applied ignoring rules are stored in the configuration file called config.yaml. This file could be easily shared between developers or even committed to remote Git. These files are always located in the .cycode folder. The folder starts with a dot (.), and you should enable the displaying of hidden files to see it.

Path of the config files

By default, all cycode ignore commands save the ignoring rule to the current directory from which CLI has been run.

Example: running ignoring CLI command from /Users/name/projects/backend will create config.yaml in /Users/name/projects/backend/.cycode

➜  backend  pwd
/Users/name/projects/backend
➜  backend  cycode ignore --by-value test-value
➜  backend  tree -a
.
└── .cycode
    └── config.yaml

2 directories, 1 file

The second option is to save ignoring rules to the global configuration files. The path of the global config is ~/.cycode/config.yaml, where ~ means user`s home directory, for example, /Users/name on macOS.

Saving to the global space could be performed with the -g flag of the cycode ignore command. For example: cycode ignore -g --by-value test-value.

Proper working directory

It is incredibly important to place the .cycode folder and run CLI from the same place. You should double-check it when working with different environments like CI/CD (GitHub Actions, Jenkins, etc.).

You can commit the .cycode folder to the root of your repository. In this scenario, you must run CLI scans from the repository root. If that doesn't fit your requirements, you could temporarily copy the .cycode folder to wherever you want and perform a CLI scan from this folder.

Structure ignoring rules in the config

It's important to understand how CLI stores ignored rules to be able to read these configuration files or even modify them without CLI.

The abstract YAML structure:

exclusions:
  {scanTypeName}:
    {ignoringType}:
    - someIgnoringValue1
    - someIgnoringValue2

Possible values of scanTypeName: iac, sca, sast, secret.

Possible values of ignoringType: paths, values, rules, packages, shas, cves.

[!WARNING] Values for "ignore by value" are not stored as plain text! CLI stores sha256 hashes of the values instead. You should put hashes of the string when modifying the configuration file by hand.

Example of real config.yaml:

exclusions:
  iac:
    rules:
    - bdaa88e2-5e7c-46ff-ac2a-29721418c59c
  sca:
    packages:
    - pyyaml@5.3.1
  secret:
    paths:
    - /Users/name/projects/build
    rules:
    - ce3a4de0-9dfc-448b-a004-c538cf8b4710
    shas:
    - a44081db3296c84b82d12a35c446a3cba19411dddfa0380134c75f7b3973bff0
    values:
    - a665a45920422f9d417e4867efdc4fb8a04a1f3fff1fa07e998e86f7f7a27ae3
    - 60303ae22b998861bce3b28f33eec1be758a213c86c93c076dbe9f558c11c752

Report Command

Generating SBOM Report

A software bill of materials (SBOM) is an inventory of all constituent components and software dependencies involved in the development and delivery of an application. Using this command, you can create an SBOM report for your local project or for your repository URI.

The following options are available for use with this command:

Option	Description	Required	Default
-f, --format [spdx-2.2|spdx-2.3|cyclonedx-1.4]	SBOM format	Yes
-o, --output-format [JSON]	Specify the output file format	No	json
--output-file PATH	Output file	No	autogenerated filename saved to the current directory
--include-vulnerabilities	Include vulnerabilities	No	False
--include-dev-dependencies	Include dev dependencies	No	False

The following commands are available for use with this command:

Command	Description
path	Generate SBOM report for provided path in the command
repository-url	Generate SBOM report for provided repository URI in the command

Repository

To create an SBOM report for a repository URI:
cycode report sbom --format <sbom format> --include-vulnerabilities --include-dev-dependencies --output-file </path/to/file> repository_url <repository url>

For example:
cycode report sbom --format spdx-2.3 --include-vulnerabilities --include-dev-dependencies repository_url https://github.com/cycodehq/cycode-cli.git

Local Project

To create an SBOM report for a path:
cycode report sbom --format <sbom format> --include-vulnerabilities --include-dev-dependencies --output-file </path/to/file> path </path/to/project>

For example:
cycode report sbom --format spdx-2.3 --include-vulnerabilities --include-dev-dependencies path /path/to/local/project

Scan Logs

All CLI scans are logged in Cycode. The logs can be found under Settings > CLI Logs.

Syntax Help

You may add the --help argument to any command at any time to see a help message that will display available options and their syntax.

To see general help, simply enter the command:

cycode --help

To see scan options, enter:

cycode scan --help

To see the options available for a specific type of scan, enter:

cycode scan {{option}} --help

For example, to see options available for a Path Scan, you would enter:

cycode scan path --help

To see the options available for the ignore scan function, use this command:

cycode ignore --help

To see the options available for a report, use this command:

cycode report --help

To see the options available for a specific type of report, enter:

cycode scan {{option}} --help