Demystifying Supply Chain Attacks: OneKey's Open Source Defense Playbook

Niq

/Jul 22, 2025

Key Takeaways

• Lock exact dependency versions and validate integrity to avoid poisoned package updates.

• Use secure practices with AI tools to prevent unintentional data leakage during development.

• Enforce access controls, 2FA, and branch protection rules to reduce internal attack surfaces.

• Sanitize logs before sending to third-party services to avoid leaking secrets or seed phrases.

• Sign and verify every client release with public hashes, GPG signatures, and runtime checks.

• Use SRI and CSP headers to prevent frontend injection from compromised third-party scripts.

In recent years, supply chain attacks have emerged as one of the most damaging and elusive threats in the Web3 ecosystem. High-profile incidents like the Bybit hack have demonstrated that even secure applications can fall victim—not due to their own code, but because of poisoned dependencies upstream.

These attacks infiltrate trust-based relationships: just like a restaurant trusting its suppliers, developers trust package registries and software vendors. Once an upstream link is compromised, the entire chain collapses—and by the time users notice, it’s already too late.

To address this, OneKey Security Lab has compiled a set of open source supply chain security best practices based on our real-world experience. This guide is designed to help developers proactively harden their projects and prevent malicious infiltration at every layer.

1. Prevent Dependency Poisoning

Supply chain attacks often insert malicious code via compromised dependencies. Key defenses include:

Lock Dependency Versions: Use lockfiles like package-lock.json, yarn.lock, or poetry.lock to prevent auto-updating to unverified versions. For embedded projects, consider using forks or Git submodules for deterministic builds.
Pin Exact Versions: Always specify exact versions (e.g., "lodash": "4.17.21") instead of ranges (^4.17.0) to avoid fetching unsafe updates.
Verify Package Integrity: Use hash verification or GPG signatures to validate downloaded dependencies. Prefer building static images from vetted sources.
Private Dependency Proxies: Host critical dependencies internally to reduce exposure to public registries.
Automated Vulnerability Scanning: Integrate tools like Dependabot, Snyk, or OWASP Dependency-Check into CI/CD to patch vulnerabilities promptly.
Maintain an SBOM: Generate a Software Bill of Materials to increase transparency and support audits.

OneKey implements real-time dependency monitoring with Dependabot, and verifies integrity during image builds.

2. Secure Use of AI Tools

AI-powered plugins (like Copilot, Cursor) can enhance productivity, but pose risks if mishandled. To mitigate sensitive data exposure:

Environment Variable Management: Never hardcode API keys or secrets. Use tools like 1Password + CLI with URL-based variable injection for dynamic and restricted access.
Context Sanitization: Ensure that secrets and private identifiers are removed before code is submitted to AI models. Tools like Cursor should not scan unauthorized directories.
Environment Isolation: Keep development environments separate from production environments. Test data should not contain real credentials.
Local AI Models: For sensitive projects, deploy AI models locally to avoid cloud leakage.

OneKey uses local-only storage with strict context isolation, ensuring AI tools cannot access unauthorized content.

3. Repository Access Control

Access control is foundational to supply chain security. Apply these principles:

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): Use least-privilege access principles for granular permissions.
Branch Protection Rules: Enforce PR reviews and CI checks on all main branches.
Regular Permission Reviews: Audit access frequently, especially for offboarded personnel.
Mandatory Two-Factor Authentication (2FA): Require 2FA for all contributors.
Temporary Access Tokens: Grant time-limited access to contractors or external contributors.
Cross-Platform Segregation: Open-source projects should use GitHub Actions only. Internal CI/CD environments must isolate API credentials carefully.

4. Prevent Sensitive Data in Logs

Logging tools like Sentry can inadvertently capture sensitive information. To reduce this risk:

PII Filtering: Configure automatic masking of personally identifiable information and keywords like seed phrases or private keys.
Custom Redaction Rules: Write filters to detect secret-like patterns before uploading.
Sensitive Word Blacklists: Mask or encrypt fields like "card", "password", or "mnemonic".
Default Behavior Audits: Disable over-collection and adjust tool defaults to minimize data capture.
Pre-Send Local Scrubbing: Sanitize crash logs locally before uploading to third-party systems.

OneKey applies strict log filtering rules and validates that no private key data is ever submitted to Sentry.

5. End-to-End Client Release Verification

Ensure all client builds are trustworthy and verifiable:

Cryptographic Signing: Sign all releases using platform-specific keys (iOS certs, Google Play keys).
Public Hash Disclosure: Publish SHA-256 digests and include GPG signatures for verification.
Validation Tools: Provide user-friendly tools and documentation for hash checking.
Immutable Storage: Store release artifacts in append-only object storage to prevent tampering.
Transparent Builds: Use GitHub Actions to enable public, traceable builds for open-source projects.
Client Self-Verification: Add in-app mechanisms to verify runtime integrity of builds.

All OneKey versions are signed, tagged, and published with verifiable audit logs.

6. Frontend SRI Verification for 3rd-Party Scripts

Frontends often import third-party scripts—these can be compromised too. Key practices:

Enable Subresource Integrity (SRI): Add integrity attributes to all <script> and <link> tags. Use tools like Mozilla Observatory to validate.
Automate Hash Generation: Integrate SRI hash calculation into the build pipeline.
Audit External Scripts Regularly: Self-host critical scripts or use known-trusted CDNs.
Content Security Policy (CSP): Restrict script origins with strict CSP headers.

OneKey ensures all entry points (e.g., index.html) are hash-locked and separates S3 buckets with fine-grained IAM policies.

Final Thoughts

Supply chain attacks don’t exploit coding bugs—they exploit trust.

They embed malicious payloads where developers least expect them, often upstream in third-party libraries or registries. And once those are compromised, even the most secure application is at risk.

The only solution is systematic defense: from dependency locking, access audits, and SRI verification, to automated build pipelines and local-only AI contexts—every step matters.

At OneKey, we believe security should start at the source. This open-source playbook is just one part of our commitment to protecting the ecosystem.

To learn more about secure development and infrastructure hardening, visit OneKey Security Lab.