Software Composition Analysis (SCA) Tools

Software Composition Analysis (SCA) Tools

Modern applications depend heavily on open-source components, making SCA tools critical for identifying vulnerable dependencies. The rapid discovery of vulnerabilities in popular libraries like Log4j highlights the importance of comprehensive dependency tracking.

Snyk leads the developer-friendly SCA space with excellent IDE integration and automated fix pull requests. WhiteSource (now Mend) provides comprehensive license compliance alongside vulnerability detection. OWASP Dependency-Check offers a solid open-source option with support for multiple ecosystems. GitHub's Dependabot provides free, automated dependency updates for GitHub-hosted projects.

// SCA integration example for Node.js projects
const { execSync } = require('child_process');
const fs = require('fs');

class DependencySecurityManager {
    constructor(projectPath) {
        this.projectPath = projectPath;
        this.vulnerabilityThresholds = {
            critical: 0,
            high: 2,
            medium: 5,
            low: 999
        };
    }
    
    async runSecurityAudit() {
        const results = {
            npm: await this.runNpmAudit(),
            snyk: await this.runSnykTest(),
            licenses: await this.checkLicenses(),
            outdated: await this.checkOutdated()
        };
        
        return this.consolidateResults(results);
    }
    
    async runNpmAudit() {
        try {
            const output = execSync('npm audit --json', {
                cwd: this.projectPath,
                encoding: 'utf8'
            });
            return JSON.parse(output);
        } catch (error) {
            // npm audit returns non-zero exit for vulnerabilities
            return JSON.parse(error.stdout);
        }
    }
    
    async runSnykTest() {
        try {
            const output = execSync('snyk test --json', {
                cwd: this.projectPath,
                encoding: 'utf8'
            });
            return JSON.parse(output);
        } catch (error) {
            return JSON.parse(error.stdout);
        }
    }
    
    async checkLicenses() {
        const output = execSync('license-checker --json --onlyAllow "MIT;Apache-2.0;BSD-3-Clause;ISC"', {
            cwd: this.projectPath,
            encoding: 'utf8'
        });
        
        const licenses = JSON.parse(output);
        const issues = [];
        
        for (const [pkg, info] of Object.entries(licenses)) {
            if (info.licenses && !this.isLicenseApproved(info.licenses)) {
                issues.push({
                    package: pkg,
                    license: info.licenses,
                    severity: 'high'
                });
            }
        }
        
        return issues;
    }
    
    async checkOutdated() {
        const output = execSync('npm outdated --json', {
            cwd: this.projectPath,
            encoding: 'utf8',
            stdio: ['pipe', 'pipe', 'ignore'] // Ignore stderr
        });
        
        const outdated = JSON.parse(output || '{}');
        const issues = [];
        
        for (const [pkg, info] of Object.entries(outdated)) {
            const majorVersionBehind = 
                parseInt(info.wanted.split('.')[0]) - 
                parseInt(info.current.split('.')[0]);
            
            if (majorVersionBehind > 0) {
                issues.push({
                    package: pkg,
                    current: info.current,
                    wanted: info.wanted,
                    latest: info.latest,
                    severity: majorVersionBehind > 2 ? 'high' : 'medium'
                });
            }
        }
        
        return issues;
    }
    
    consolidateResults(results) {
        const consolidated = {
            summary: {
                critical: 0,
                high: 0,
                medium: 0,
                low: 0
            },
            vulnerabilities: [],
            licenses: results.licenses,
            outdated: results.outdated,
            recommendations: []
        };
        
        // Process npm audit results
        if (results.npm.metadata) {
            Object.entries(results.npm.metadata.vulnerabilities).forEach(([level, count]) => {
                consolidated.summary[level] = count;
            });
        }
        
        // Add Snyk results
        if (results.snyk.vulnerabilities) {
            results.snyk.vulnerabilities.forEach(vuln => {
                consolidated.vulnerabilities.push({
                    source: 'snyk',
                    package: vuln.packageName,
                    severity: vuln.severity,
                    title: vuln.title,
                    cve: vuln.identifiers.CVE,
                    fixedIn: vuln.fixedIn
                });
            });
        }
        
        // Generate recommendations
        if (consolidated.summary.critical > 0) {
            consolidated.recommendations.push(
                'URGENT: Fix critical vulnerabilities immediately'
            );
        }
        
        if (consolidated.licenses.length > 0) {
            consolidated.recommendations.push(
                'Review and approve non-standard licenses'
            );
        }
        
        return consolidated;
    }
    
    async generateSBOM() {
        // Software Bill of Materials generation
        const sbom = {
            bomFormat: 'CycloneDX',
            specVersion: '1.4',
            serialNumber: `urn:uuid:${this.generateUUID()}`,
            version: 1,
            metadata: {
                timestamp: new Date().toISOString(),
                tools: [{
                    vendor: 'SecurityManager',
                    name: 'dependency-security-manager',
                    version: '1.0.0'
                }]
            },
            components: []
        };
        
        // Read package-lock.json for complete dependency tree
        const lockFile = JSON.parse(
            fs.readFileSync(`${this.projectPath}/package-lock.json`, 'utf8')
        );
        
        // Convert to CycloneDX format
        Object.entries(lockFile.dependencies || {}).forEach(([name, info]) => {
            sbom.components.push({
                type: 'library',
                bom_ref: `pkg:npm/${name}@${info.version}`,
                name: name,
                version: info.version,
                purl: `pkg:npm/${name}@${info.version}`,
                licenses: info.license ? [{ license: { id: info.license } }] : []
            });
        });
        
        return sbom;
    }
    
    generateUUID() {
        return 'xxxxxxxx-xxxx-4xxx-yxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx'.replace(/[xy]/g, (c) => {
            const r = Math.random() * 16 | 0;
            const v = c === 'x' ? r : (r & 0x3 | 0x8);
            return v.toString(16);
        });
    }
}

// Usage example
async function main() {
    const manager = new DependencySecurityManager('./');
    
    console.log('Running security audit...');
    const results = await manager.runSecurityAudit();
    
    // Check against thresholds
    if (results.summary.critical > manager.vulnerabilityThresholds.critical ||
        results.summary.high > manager.vulnerabilityThresholds.high) {
        console.error('Security thresholds exceeded!');
        console.log(JSON.stringify(results, null, 2));
        process.exit(1);
    }
    
    // Generate SBOM for compliance
    const sbom = await manager.generateSBOM();
    fs.writeFileSync('sbom.json', JSON.stringify(sbom, null, 2));
    
    console.log('Security audit passed');
}

main().catch(console.error);