Automated Software Supply Chain Security to Address Risk Fast

Software supply chain security is the practice of protecting all components, processes, and stakeholders involved in developing and delivering software. At Sonatype, we view it as securing every stage — from dependencies to deployment — against open source malware, vulnerabilities, and tampering. The most effective software supply chain security strategies focus on ensuring trust, integrity, and compliance across the software development life cycle (SDLC) to prevent breaches before they happen.

Today’s applications are built from hundreds or thousands of dependencies sourced from public repositories and vendors. While open source accelerates innovation, it also introduces significant software supply chain risks. Attackers can compromise a single library, package, or build tool and impact every organization that depends on it.

At the same time, many organizations lack mature software supply chain management practices. Outdated dependencies, unverified components, and limited visibility into what’s actually running in production make it difficult to identify and respond to threats. Attackers take advantage of this gap, targeting trusted components and update mechanisms to bypass traditional security controls.

The rise of automation, CI/CD pipelines, and cloud-native development has further increased the scale and speed of attacks, allowing malicious code to spread faster than ever before. Without proactive software supply chain risk management, these threats can remain undetected deep into production environments.

Software supply chain management gives organizations the visibility, control, and automation needed to reduce software supply chain risks across the entire development life cycle. Without effective software supply chain management, organizations struggle to understand what code they are using, where it came from, and whether it can be trusted — leaving attackers ample opportunity to exploit hidden weaknesses.

A secure software supply chain depends on managing and protecting every stage of software creation and delivery. Key components include code integrity, strong dependency management, and strict access control to ensure only trusted code and contributors are allowed into builds. Secure build processes, signed artifacts, and reliable automation help prevent tampering and ensure software hasn’t been altered between development and deployment.

Equally important are continuous monitoring, vulnerability scanning, and SBOM management, which provide traceability into all components and dependencies. These capabilities allow teams to quickly identify vulnerable or malicious components, respond to emerging threats, and maintain compliance. Together, they form the backbone of effective software supply chain risk management, enabling early threat detection rather than reactive incident response.

The most common risks in securing the software supply chain include compromised or malicious third-party components and AI models, lack of visibility into dependencies, unpatched vulnerabilities, complacent consumption choices, and insecure CI/CD pipelines. Attackers exploit these weak points to inject malware, steal data, or disrupt services. Robust monitoring and verification are essential for mitigation.

Automated security scanning helps mitigate software supply chain risks by continuously detecting vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and threats in code, applications, and infrastructure. It enables faster remediation, reduces human error, ensures compliance, and provides real-time insights — helping organizations establish a secure software supply chain. 

Binary artifact repositories provide a central, controlled location to store, manage, and verify software components, which is an important aspect of securing the software supply chain. They ensure integrity through checksums, support access control, and enable traceability, helping prevent the use of malicious or tampered dependencies in builds and deployments.

Software supply chain security integrates with CI/CD pipelines by embedding security checks at each stage — scanning dependencies, verifying code integrity, and using signed artifacts. Sonatype integrates with CI/CD tools (e.g., Jenkins, GitHub Actions) to ensure secure, compliant artifacts are used from development through deployment.

AI and machine learning can help secure software supply chains by analyzing vast open source data to detect vulnerabilities, malicious code, and risky components in real time. Sonatype uses AI to automate threat detection and enforce secure coding practices, reducing human error and accelerating secure software delivery.

Software supply chains are increasingly vulnerable due to the growing prevalence of open source malware, unchecked dependency risks, and persistent vulnerabilities. According to Sonatype's State of the Software Supply Chain Report, malicious open source packages are rising fast, with a 156% YOY spike and over 828K threats. Traditional security tools can't detect many novel attacks. Developers face risks from protestware, ransomware, and software supply chain breaches like the Snowflake incident. Having a comprehensive solution for software supply chain management and security can help organizations mitigate their risk and manage open source more effectively.