Vulnerability Scanning
Trivy detects known vulnerabilities in software components that it finds in the scan target.
The following are supported:
OS Packages
Trivy is capable of automatically detecting installed OS packages when scanning container images, VM images and running hosts.
Note
Trivy doesn't support third-party/self-compiled packages/binaries, but official packages provided by vendors such as Red Hat and Debian.
Supported OS
See here for the supported OSes.
Data Sources
| OS | Source |
|---|---|
| Arch Linux | Vulnerable Issues |
| Alpine Linux | secdb |
| Wolfi Linux | secdb |
| Chainguard | secdb |
| Amazon Linux | Amazon Linux Security Center |
| Debian | Security Bug Tracker / OVAL |
| Ubuntu | Ubuntu CVE Tracker |
| RHEL/CentOS | OVAL / Security Data |
| AlmaLinux | AlmaLinux Product Errata |
| Rocky Linux | Rocky Linux UpdateInfo |
| Oracle Linux | OVAL |
| CBL-Mariner | OVAL |
| OpenSUSE/SLES | CVRF |
| Photon OS | Photon Security Advisory |
Data Source Selection
Trivy only consumes security advisories from the sources listed in the above table.
As for packages installed from OS package managers (dpkg, yum, apk, etc.), Trivy uses the advisory database from the appropriate OS vendor.
For example: for a python package installed from yum (Amazon linux), Trivy will only get advisories from ALAS.
But for a python package installed from another source (e.g. pip), Trivy will get advisories from the GitLab and GitHub databases.
This advisory selection is essential to avoid getting false positives because OS vendors usually backport upstream fixes, and the fixed version can be different from the upstream fixed version.
Severity Selection
The severity is taken from the selected data source since the severity from vendors is more accurate. Using CVE-2023-0464 as an example, while it is rated as "HIGH" in NVD, Red Hat has marked its 'Impact' as "Low". As a result, Trivy will display it as "Low".
The severity depends on the compile option, the default configuration, etc. NVD doesn't know how the vendor distributes the software. Red Hat evaluates the severity more accurately. That's why Trivy prefers vendor scores over NVD.
If the data source does not provide a severity, the severity is determined based on the CVSS score as follows:
| Base Score Range | Severity |
|---|---|
| 0.1-3.9 | Low |
| 4.0-6.9 | Medium |
| 7.0-8.9 | High |
| 9.0-10.0 | Critical |
If the CVSS score is also not provided, it falls back to NVD.
NVD and some vendors may delay severity analysis, while other vendors, such as Red Hat, are able to quickly evaluate and announce the severity of vulnerabilities. To avoid marking too many vulnerabilities as "UNKNOWN" severity, Trivy uses severity ratings from other vendors when the NVD information is not yet available. The order of preference for vendor severity data can be found here.
You can reference SeveritySource in the JSON reporting format to see from where the severity is taken for a given vulnerability.
"SeveritySource": "debian",
In addition, you can see all the vendor severity ratings.
"VendorSeverity": {
"amazon": 2,
"cbl-mariner": 4,
"ghsa": 4,
"nvd": 4,
"photon": 4,
"redhat": 2,
"ubuntu": 2
}
Here is the severity mapping in Trivy:
| Number | Severity |
|---|---|
| 0 | Unknown |
| 1 | Low |
| 2 | Medium |
| 3 | High |
| 4 | Critical |
If no vendor has a severity, the UNKNOWN severity will be used.
Unfixed Vulnerabilities
The unfixed/unfixable vulnerabilities mean that the patch has not yet been provided on their distribution.
To hide unfixed/unfixable vulnerabilities, you can use the --ignore-unfixed flag.
Language-specific Packages
Supported Languages
See here for the supported languages.
Data Sources
| Language | Source | Commercial Use | Delay1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| PHP | PHP Security Advisories Database | ✅ | - |
| GitHub Advisory Database (Composer) | ✅ | - | |
| Python | GitHub Advisory Database (pip) | ✅ | - |
| Open Source Vulnerabilities (PyPI) | ✅ | - | |
| Ruby | Ruby Advisory Database | ✅ | - |
| GitHub Advisory Database (RubyGems) | ✅ | - | |
| Node.js | Ecosystem Security Working Group | ✅ | - |
| GitHub Advisory Database (npm) | ✅ | - | |
| Java | GitHub Advisory Database (Maven) | ✅ | - |
| Go | GitHub Advisory Database (Go) | ✅ | - |
| Go Vulnerability Database | ✅ | - | |
| Rust | Open Source Vulnerabilities (crates.io) | ✅ | - |
| .NET | GitHub Advisory Database (NuGet) | ✅ | - |
| C/C++ | GitLab Advisories Community | ✅ | 1 month |
| Dart | GitHub Advisory Database (Pub) | ✅ | - |
| Elixir | GitHub Advisory Database (Erlang) | ✅ | - |
| Swift | GitHub Advisory Database (Swift) | ✅ | - |
Non-packaged software
If you have software that is not managed by a package manager, Trivy can still detect vulnerabilities in it in some cases:
- Using SBOM from Sigstore Rekor
- Go Binaries with embedded module information
- Rust Binaries with embedded information
- SBOM embedded in container images
Kubernetes
Trivy can detect vulnerabilities in Kubernetes clusters and components by scanning a Kubernetes Cluster, or a KBOM (Kubernetes bill of Material). To learn more, see the documentation for Kubernetes scanning.
Data Sources
| Vendor | Source |
|---|---|
| Kubernetes | Kubernetes Official CVE feed1 |
Database
Trivy downloads the vulnerability database every 6 hours. Trivy uses two types of databases for vulnerability detection:
- Vulnerability Database
- Java Index Database
This page provides detailed information about these databases.
Vulnerability Database
Trivy utilizes a database containing vulnerability information. This database is built every six hours on GitHub and is distributed via GitHub Container registry (GHCR). The database is cached and updated as needed. As Trivy updates the database automatically during execution, users don't need to be concerned about it.
For CLI flags related to the database, please refer to this page.
Private Hosting
If you host the database on your own OCI registry, you can specify a different repository with the --db-repository flag.
The default is ghcr.io/aquasecurity/trivy-db.
$ trivy image --db-repository YOUR_REPO YOUR_IMAGE
If authentication is required, it can be configured in the same way as for private images. Please refer to the documentation for more details.
Java Index Database
This database is only downloaded when scanning JAR files so that Trivy can identify the groupId, artifactId, and version of JAR files. It is built once a day on GitHub and distributed via GitHub Container registry (GHCR). Like the vulnerability database, it is automatically downloaded and updated when needed, so users don't need to worry about it.
Private Hosting
If you host the database on your own OCI registry, you can specify a different repository with the --java-db-repository flag.
The default is ghcr.io/aquasecurity/trivy-java-db.
If authentication is required, you need to run docker login YOUR_REGISTRY.
Currently, specifying a username and password is not supported.
Configuration
This section describes vulnerability-specific configuration. Other common options are documented here.
Enabling a subset of package types
It's possible to only enable certain package types if you prefer.
You can do so by passing the --vuln-type option.
This flag takes a comma-separated list of package types.
Available values:
- os
- Scan OS packages managed by the OS package manager (e.g.
dpkg,yum,apk).
- Scan OS packages managed by the OS package manager (e.g.
- library
- Scan language-specific packages (e.g. packages installed by
pip,npm, orgem).
- Scan language-specific packages (e.g. packages installed by
$ trivy image --vuln-type os ruby:2.4.0
Result
2019-05-22T19:36:50.530+0200 [34mINFO[0m Updating vulnerability database...
2019-05-22T19:36:51.681+0200 [34mINFO[0m Detecting Alpine vulnerabilities...
2019-05-22T19:36:51.685+0200 [34mINFO[0m Updating npm Security DB...
2019-05-22T19:36:52.389+0200 [34mINFO[0m Detecting npm vulnerabilities...
2019-05-22T19:36:52.390+0200 [34mINFO[0m Updating pipenv Security DB...
2019-05-22T19:36:53.406+0200 [34mINFO[0m Detecting pipenv vulnerabilities...
ruby:2.4.0 (debian 8.7)
=======================
Total: 7 (UNKNOWN: 0, LOW: 1, MEDIUM: 1, HIGH: 3, CRITICAL: 2)
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| LIBRARY | VULNERABILITY ID | SEVERITY | INSTALLED VERSION | FIXED VERSION | TITLE |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| curl | CVE-2018-14618 | CRITICAL | 7.61.0-r0 | 7.61.1-r0 | curl: NTLM password overflow |
| | | | | | via integer overflow |
+ +------------------+----------+ +---------------+----------------------------------+
| | CVE-2018-16839 | HIGH | | 7.61.1-r1 | curl: Integer overflow leading |
| | | | | | to heap-based buffer overflow in |
| | | | | | Curl_sasl_create_plain_message() |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| git | CVE-2018-17456 | HIGH | 2.15.2-r0 | 2.15.3-r0 | git: arbitrary code execution |
| | | | | | via .gitmodules |
+ +------------------+ + + +----------------------------------+
| | CVE-2018-19486 | | | | git: Improper handling of |
| | | | | | PATH allows for commands to be |
| | | | | | executed from... |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| libssh2 | CVE-2019-3855 | CRITICAL | 1.8.0-r2 | 1.8.1-r0 | libssh2: Integer overflow in |
| | | | | | transport read resulting in |
| | | | | | out of bounds write... |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| sqlite | CVE-2018-20346 | MEDIUM | 3.21.0-r1 | 3.25.3-r0 | CVE-2018-20505 CVE-2018-20506 |
| | | | | | sqlite: Multiple flaws in |
| | | | | | sqlite which can be triggered |
| | | | | | via... |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+
| tar | CVE-2018-20482 | LOW | 1.29-r1 | 1.31-r0 | tar: Infinite read loop in |
| | | | | | sparse_dump_region function in |
| | | | | | sparse.c |
+---------+------------------+----------+-------------------+---------------+----------------------------------+