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When you identify that a code scanning alert is a false positive—such as when your code uses a custom sanitization method not recognized by the analysis—you should dismiss the alert with the reason “false positive.” This action helps improve the accuracy of future analyses and maintains the relevance of your security alerts. As per GitHub’s documentation:“If you dismiss a CodeQL alert as a false positive result, for example because the code uses a sanitization library that isn’t supported, consider contributing to the CodeQL repository and improving the analysis.”By dismissing the alert appropriately, you ensure that your codebase’s security alerts remain actionable and relevant.

Dependabot alerts are generated as soon as GitHub detects a known vulnerability in one of your dependencies. GitHub does this by analyzing your repository’s dependency graph and matching it against vulnerabilities listed in the GitHub Advisory Database. Once a match is found, the system raises an alert automatically without waiting for a PR or manual action.This allows organizations to proactively mitigate vulnerabilities as early as possible, based on real- time detection.Reference: GitHub Docs – About Dependabot alerts; Managing alerts in GitHub Dependabot

Dependabot builds a dependency graph by analyzing package manifests and lockfiles in your repository. This graph includes both direct and transitive dependencies. It then compares this graph against the GitHub Advisory Database, which includes curated, security-reviewed advisories.This method provides a comprehensive and automated way to discover all known vulnerabilities across your dependency tree.Reference: GitHub Docs – About the dependency graph; About Dependabot alerts

A security policy is defined by a SECURITY.md file in the root of your repository or .github/ directory. This file informs contributors and security researchers about how to responsibly report vulnerabilities. It improves your project’s transparency and ensures timely communication and mitigation of any reported issues.Adding this file also enables a “Report a vulnerability” button in the repository’s Security tab. Reference: GitHub Docs – Adding a security policy to your repository

Using the Custom setting allows you to subscribe to specific event types, such as Dependabot alerts or vulnerability notifications, without being overwhelmed by all repository activity. This is essential for repository maintainers who need fine-grained control over what kinds of events trigger notifications.This setting is configurable per repository and allows users to stay aware of critical issues while minimizing notification noise.Reference: GitHub Docs – Configuring notifications; Managing security alerts

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation:To receive Dependabot alert notifications for a repository, you can utilize the following Watch settings:Custom setting: Allows you to tailor your notifications, enabling you to subscribe specifically to security alerts, including those from Dependabot.All Activity setting: Subscribes you to all notifications for the repository, encompassing issues, pull requests, and security alerts like those from Dependabot.The Participating and @mentions setting limits notifications to conversations you’re directly involved in or mentioned, which may not include security alerts. The Ignore setting unsubscribes you from all notifications, including critical security alerts.GitHub Docs+1GitHub Docs+1Reference: GitHub Docs – Configuring notifications; Managing security alerts

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation:When configuring Dependabot via the dependabot.yml file, the following fields are mandatory for each update configuration:directory: Specifies the location of the package manifest within the repository. This tells Dependabot where to look for dependency files.package-ecosystem: Indicates the type of package manager (e.g., npm, pip, maven) used in the specified directory.schedule.interval: Defines how frequently Dependabot checks for updates (e.g., daily, weekly). This ensures regular scanning for outdated or vulnerable dependencies.The milestone field is optional and used for associating pull requests with milestones. The allow field is also optional and used to specify which dependencies to update.GitLabReference: GitHub Docs – Configuration options for dependency updates

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation:For code scanning to be triggered on a specific branch, the branch must contain the appropriate workflow file, typically located in the .github/workflows directory. This YAML file defines the code scanning configuration and specifies the events that trigger the scan (e.g., push, pull_request).Without the workflow file in the branch, GitHub Actions will not execute the code scanning process for that branch. The repository’s visibility (private or public), the status of secret scanning, or the activity level of developers do not directly influence the triggering of code scanning.Reference: GitHub Docs – About workflows; About code scanning alerts

The correct place to look is the SECURITY.md file. This file provides contributors and security researchers with instructions on how to responsibly report vulnerabilities. It may include contact methods, preferred communication channels (e.g., security team email), and disclosure guidelines.This file is considered a GitHub best practice and, when present, activates a “Report a vulnerability” button in the repository’s Security tab.Reference: GitHub Docs – Adding a security policy to your repository

After generating an alert for a vulnerable dependency, Dependabot automatically attempts to create a pull request to upgrade that dependency to the minimum required secure version—if a fix is available and compatible with your project.This automated PR helps teams fix vulnerabilities quickly with minimal manual intervention. You can also configure update behaviors using dependabot.yml, but in the default state, PR creation is automatic.Reference: GitHub Docs – About Dependabot alerts; About Dependabot security updates

The first step when you receive a secret scanning alert is to revoke the secret if it is still valid. This ensures the secret can no longer be used maliciously. Only after revoking it should you proceed to remove it from the code history and apply other mitigation steps.Simply deleting the secret from the code does not remove the risk if it hasn’t been revoked — especially since it may already be exposed in commit history.Reference: GitHub Docs – About secret scanning alerts; Remediating a secret scanning alert