Plan Dependency Provenance

Dependency Provenance & Supply-Chain Audit + Remediation Plan

Degree of freedom: HIGH — resolve, classify, plan. Stay plan-only. Never install a suspect package to "check".

This skill vs neighbors

How to reason (every plan item)

1. Propose — verify, remove, pin, or license-remediate a package
2. Risk — squat, unsigned install, license conflict, or lockfile roll
3. Keep-working — packages that already resolve, pin, and license clean
4. Phase — verify/remove → lock & pin → license → de-bloat (do not execute)

Worked example

Propose: remove fast-cache-utils (no registry hit); do not npm install it to "check". Risk: AI-suggested name is a squat — install is the attack. Keep-working: zod resolves, MIT, maintained repo. Phase: Phase 1 — verify/remove suspect packages.

Role: Senior supply-chain engineer + open-source compliance specialist.

Task: Resolve every direct dependency against its registry, run checklist A–E, build the provenance table, phase remediations, emit plan-dependency-provenance.md. Audit & plan only — never install suspect packages to verify.

Verify every package is real, safe, and licensed. Install nothing until approved.

In a vibe-coding loop "just install the suggested package" is the default move — and it's now a documented attack surface. The Cloud Security Alliance's 2026 research found AI coding tools recommend non-existent package names ~20% of the time, and 43% of those hallucinated names recur on every run of the same prompt. Consistent hallucinations are predictable; predictable names are registerable. Attackers pre-register them on npm/PyPI — slopsquatting — then wait for developers (or autonomous agents) to run the exact npm install / pip install the AI just wrote. With agents executing their own generated install commands, the human checkpoint disappears entirely.

This skill is the audit-and-plan half. Execution (removal, replacement, pinning, license remediation) is handed off after you approve each phase.

When this fires

Trigger phrases: "check my dependencies", "is this package real", "slopsquatting", "are my packages safe", "audit my supply chain", "license check", "generate an SBOM", "did the AI invent a package", "pre-launch / pre-open-source dependency audit".

Do not fire for: routine version bumps (/update-deps), bundle-size trimming (audit-bundle-size), or general repo cleanup (workflow-housekeep). This skill owns existence, integrity, provenance, and licensing of dependencies.

Why a dedicated skill

/update-deps assumes the packages are legitimate and just need upgrading. This skill asks the prior question the AI era forces: is this package even real, who published it, when, and under what license?

The audit [HIGH freedom]

A · Existence & slopsquatting (the AI-era core)

• Resolve every direct dependency against its registry. Flag any that don't exist, were published very recently, have near-zero downloads, or inconsistent history.
• Typo / confusion check — names one edit away from a popular package (reqests, lodahs), or conflation names merging two real packages.
• AI-origin flag — obscure/novel deps in vibe-coded projects: guilty-until-verified.
• Maintainer & repo signals — no source repo, single recent maintainer: elevate.

B · Lockfile & integrity

• Lockfile present and committed? No lockfile = every install is a fresh roll.
• Pinned vs floating — wildcard/^/latest on security-sensitive deps.
• Lockfile drift — manifest and lockfile disagree.

C · Provenance & patch history

• Source repo reachable, actively maintained, not archived.
• Known vulnerabilities — flag deps with open advisories (recommend Socket.dev / Phylum / npm audit / pip-audit in execution).
• Install scripts — postinstall reaching network/filesystem: flag for review.

D · Licensing

• License inventory — SPDX per dependency. Flag copyleft in proprietary paths, "no license", conflicts with project license.
• Attribution gaps — bundled code lacking NOTICE.

E · Bloat & blast radius

• Transitive depth — direct vs total; duplicate libs.
• Unused dependencies — declared but never imported. Flag the manifest fact here; the module-graph proof and removal belong to plan-dead-code → housekeep-dead-code. Do not hand-verify with a grep — a dep reached only from a config string looks unused and is not.

For each finding: package, issue, evidence, severity, remediation direction.

Procedure [HIGH freedom]

1. Inventory. Parse manifests + lockfiles. State ecosystems and resolution limits.
2. Resolve & classify. Checklist A–E. Tag Critical / High / Med / Low.
3. Build the provenance table — key artifact.
4. Phase the burndown. Verify/remove suspect packages first.
5. Emit plan-dependency-provenance.md. End the turn. Do not install anything.

Guardrails [LOW freedom — run exactly]

• Plan only. No install, add, remove, update, or lockfile edits.
• Never install to "check". That is exactly the attack.
• Guilty until verified for AI-suggested obscure deps.
• Existence ≠ safety. Run the full checklist.
• License is a real finding.
• Recommend create-hook pre-install allowlist as regression gate.
• Minimal quoting of manifests.

Self-critique before the burndown [LOW freedom — do not skip]

1. evidenced-not-assumed — registry resolve (or "none found"), not vibe
2. plan-only — no install/add/remove/update to "check"
3. phase justified — squat/non-existent is Phase 1, not de-bloat
4. right-owner — routine bumps → /update-deps; bundle trim → audit-bundle-size; unimported deps + dead source → plan-dead-code
5. no-false-safety — exists ≠ safe; license is a finding

Report template — plan-dependency-provenance.md

# Dependency Provenance & Supply-Chain Audit — <repo>

_Audit-only. Nothing is installed, removed, or upgraded until each phase is approved._

## Scope
- Ecosystems: npm ☐ pip ☐ other ☐  | Direct deps: n  Transitive: n
- Lockfile(s): present ☐ committed ☐  | Assumptions: …

## Verdict
| Severity | Count | Worst case |
|----------|-------|-----------|
| Critical | n | non-existent / squat-suspect / malicious package installed |
| High     | n | no lockfile, license conflict, open advisory |
| Medium   | n | floating pins, abandoned upstream |
| Low      | n | bloat, unused deps |

## Provenance table (suspect + notable)
| Package | Exists? | First pub | Weekly DLs | License | Repo | Verdict |
|---------|---------|-----------|------------|---------|------|---------|
| fast-cache-utils | ❓ none found | — | — | — | none | Crit: likely hallucinated → remove |

## Findings
| # | Package | Issue | Evidence | Sev | Direction |
|---|---------|-------|----------|-----|-----------|

## Phased burndown
- **Phase 1 — Verify/remove suspect packages** → manual verify + removal
- **Phase 2 — Lock & pin** → `workflow-housekeep`
- **Phase 3 — License & advisories** → wire Socket.dev/Phylum/npm-audit
- **Phase 4 — De-bloat** → remove unused/duplicate deps
- **Gate** → `create-hook` pre-install allowlist

## Execution handoff
Approve a phase to run it. Re-scan after; add the install-time gate.

Chains with

• Pre-launch hardening loop — supply-chain layer alongside security spine.
• plan-secrets-audit — both feed create-hook regression gates.
• Execution: workflow-housekeep, create-hook, /update-deps (after verified), audit-security.
• Verify: re-resolve tree; confirm install-time gate is live.

Plan with a strong model; execute with composer-2.5-execution.mdc. The plan says which packages are suspect; the rule forbids "just installing it to see".