Read 2026-10-28
skyvern-ai/skyvern: technical due diligence, read from its repository
What Borehole read in skyvern-ai/skyvern's code and history at aa83f63: its licence, security advisories, releases, review practice, tests, dependencies and operations. Every finding cites the file and line it rests on. The full report also covers the team and asks the questions the code cannot answer.
| Dimension | Rating |
|---|---|
| Architecture & Codebase — including AI provenance | strong |
| Engineering Process & SDLC Maturity | strong |
| Product & Engineering Maturity | adequate |
| Security & Reliability Posture | adequate |
| Observability & Operations | adequate |
| Fit with the Acquirer | not assessable |
What the repository says
.gitmodules:1: 1 submodule(s) this survey does not read: integrations/n8n
Architecture & Codebase — including AI provenance
strongskyvern/forge/sdk/workflow/models/block.py is 20,724 lines, 213× this codebase's median file
adequateThe median source file here is 97 lines. 137 files exceed 1,000 lines, the largest being 20,724. Size is not a defect on its own — some problems genuinely live in one place — but these are where merge conflicts, review fatigue and single-owner knowledge concentrate, and they are the first thing that slows an inheriting engineer down.
skyvern/forge/sdk/workflow/models/block.py:1 — 20,724 lines (213× median) |
skyvern/forge/sdk/workflow/service.py:1 — 19,146 lines (197× median) |
skyvern/webeye/actions/handler.py:1 — 17,451 lines (179× median) |
skyvern/forge/agent.py:1 — 13,125 lines (135× median) |
skyvern-frontend/src/routes/workflows/copilot/WorkflowCopilotChat.tsx:1 — 11,703 lines (120× median) |
Engineering Process & SDLC Maturity
strongNo finding.
Product & Engineering Maturity
adequateAPI v1 and v2 have been served together for 21 months
adequatev2 first appeared in Jan 2025, and v1 is still in the code 21 months later. Two versions mean two surfaces to secure, document and support. Ask who still calls the old one, and whether retiring it is planned.
skyvern/forge/sdk/agent.py — v1 since Mar 2024 |
skyvern/forge/api_app.py — v2 since Jan 2025 |
Security & Reliability Posture
adequate1 credential-shaped string in the tree sit in tests, examples, documentation or local development settings
adequateStrings shaped like credentials appear only where fakes are usual: test fixtures, examples, documentation, placeholders and local stacks. They are almost always fakes. Ask someone to confirm that none of them works anywhere, because a real key in a development file is still a real key.
| JWT, where fakes are usual |
2 Dockerfiles run the application as root
adequateNo USER instruction switches away from root, so the process runs with full privileges inside the container. It is a one-line fix and an ordinary expectation, which is why its absence is worth asking about: it usually says more about whether anyone has reviewed the deployment than about this container specifically.
Dockerfile — runs as root |
integrations/mcp/Dockerfile — runs as root |
The build runs third-party code it does not pin
adequate11 steps pipe a download straight into a shell. Tags have been moved to malicious commits in real supply-chain attacks, and a piped script is whatever the server returns that minute. Pinning to a commit is the fix, and it is small.
.github/workflows/ci.yml:45 — download piped into a shell |
6 outbound calls can wait forever
adequate6 HTTP calls use a client with no timeout (Python `requests` without `timeout=`, or Go's default client). When a dependency slows down, each one holds a worker until the connection gives up, and enough of them take the service down with the dependency.
evaluation/core/__init__.py:46 — outbound call without a timeout |
evaluation/core/__init__.py:55 — outbound call without a timeout |
evaluation/core/__init__.py:62 — outbound call without a timeout |
1 SQL statement built from strings
adequate1 places in product code build SQL by formatting or joining strings rather than passing parameters. In each, what the code shows going in is a table or column name, a constant, or something the line does not show, not a request's value. Ask whether any value reaches these strings, rather than a parameter.
skyvern/webeye/profile_download_state.py:34 — SQL built from a string |
9 shell commands built from strings
adequate9 places run a command through a shell (`shell=True`, `os.system`, `exec` with a template) rather than passing arguments. Where any part comes from outside, it is command injection. Ask where each one's input comes from.
run_streaming.py:68 — command run through a shell |
skyvern/cli/database.py:34 — command run through a shell |
skyvern/cli/database.py:265 — command run through a shell |
3 deserialisers that can run code
adequate3 places read data with a deserialiser that executes what it reads (pickle, `yaml.load` without a safe loader). That is safe on data the system wrote itself and remote code execution on anything else. Ask where each one's input comes from.
skyvern/forge/sdk/utils/capped_subprocess_child.py:46 — code-executing deserialiser |
skyvern/forge/sdk/utils/capped_subprocess_child.py:48 — code-executing deserialiser |
skyvern/utils/yaml_loader.py:56 — code-executing deserialiser |
5 locked dependencies have published vulnerabilities, 2 high or critical in what ships
adequate5 of 1,121 locked dependencies match 5 published advisories in OSV, 3 of them rated high or critical. A lockfile says which version is installed, not whether the flawed code is reachable from this product, so each needs a look. Most are fixed by an upgrade, and the advisory names the version.
skyvern-frontend/package-lock.json — body-parser 1.20.6: GHSA-27r3-jxmh-p828 (high), fixed in 1.20.9 |
skyvern-frontend/package-lock.json — zod 3.25.76: GHSA-mrhx-c7xc-m3w5 (high), fixed in 4.6.6 |
uv.lock — litellm 1.89.7: GHSA-g5ff-637f-6q2m (high), fixed in 1.95.0; an optional extra |
6 places insert HTML from a variable without sanitising it
adequate6 places set HTML from a value that is neither a literal nor passed through a sanitiser. Where the value can come from a user, that is stored cross-site scripting, and it is the first thing a buyer's security review looks for in a frontend.
site_fixtures/code_host/index.html:246 — HTML from a variable |
site_fixtures/code_host/index.html:276 — HTML from a variable |
site_fixtures/code_host/index.html:315 — HTML from a variable |
2 advisories against this project in the last 24 months, 2 high or critical
adequateThe newest was published on 2026-08-29. A project that publishes advisories is telling its users about its fixes, and the count and pace say how much security work it carries. None of them affects the surveyed version.
| 2026-08-29: CVE-2026-82447 (high): Skyvern before 1.0.45 contains a sandbox escape vulnerability in TextPromptBlock that renders prompts twice, first through a sandboxed Jinja environment and the |
| 2025-06-07: GHSA-h92g-3xc3-ww2r (high): Skyvern has a Jinja runtime leak |
Observability & Operations
adequateNo error reporter is wired in
adequateNothing in the service initialises an error reporter (Sentry, Rollbar, Bugsnag, Honeybadger or an APM agent). An exception in production reaches a person only if someone is reading the logs, which usually means a customer reports it first.
| no error reporter initialised |
Readiness and liveness probes are identical in 1 of 1 workloads
adequateBoth probes call the same endpoint. When a dependency slows down, the liveness probe fails with the readiness probe, so the platform restarts pods that only needed taking out of rotation, and a partial outage becomes a full one. Liveness should ask whether the process is alive; readiness whether it can serve.
k8s/charts/skyvern-ui/templates/deployment.yaml — same probe endpoint twice |
3 of 4 deployments run a single replica
adequate3 deployments set `replicas: 1`, and nothing (an autoscaler, a disruption budget) adds more. Every deploy and every node drain is downtime, and the availability the buyer inherits has a ceiling.
kubernetes-deployment/backend/backend-deployment.yaml — replicas: 1 |
kubernetes-deployment/frontend/frontend-deployment.yaml — replicas: 1 |
kubernetes-deployment/postgres/postgres-deployment.yaml — replicas: 1 |
Fit with the Acquirer
not assessableNot rated: structurally not assessable from a repository.
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The full report on skyvern-ai/skyvern: every dimension, the questions for the room, and the audit log.
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