Managing false positives in security alerts for a monorepo with multi-environment workflows

[Zypheron47]

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Hi,
I’m working with a monorepo that has multiple environments (dev, staging, prod), and I use GitHub Code Security to detect vulnerabilities in dependencies through CI/CD workflows.

However, I’m facing many false positives in the vulnerable dependency alerts, which makes it hard to manage and prioritize issues.

How can I configure GitHub Code Security to:

Minimize false positives in a multi-environment setup?

Customize security rules per environment or per folder within a monorepo?

Automate alert management to improve accuracy and relevance of reports?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Kamionn]

Hi, @Zypheron47

Managing false positives in security alerts within a monorepo and multi-environment workflows can indeed be challenging. Here are some best practices and tips to help you configure GitHub Code Security effectively:

Use Dependabot Configuration per Directory:
In a monorepo, you can create multiple dependabot.yml files scoped to specific directories. This allows you to tailor dependency updates and vulnerability scanning per project or environment folder, reducing irrelevant alerts.

Suppress or Ignore Specific Alerts:
GitHub Code Security allows you to dismiss alerts that are false positives or not applicable. Use the “Dismiss alert” feature with clear reasoning to keep your alert list relevant and manageable.

Leverage Security Policies and Automation:

Use GitHub’s security policy files (SECURITY.md) to define how vulnerabilities are handled.

Integrate workflows that automatically label or triage alerts based on severity or environment, using GitHub Actions.

Automate alerts assignment to appropriate teams or maintainers for faster resolution.

Customize Scanning Scope per Workflow:
Configure your CI/CD workflows to scan only the relevant directories or dependencies related to each environment. This reduces noise from unrelated components.

Use CodeQL Query Customization:
If you use CodeQL for advanced scanning, customize or disable specific queries that generate false positives for your codebase.

Stay Updated on GitHub Security Features:
GitHub continuously improves security tools, including filtering and alert accuracy. Keep your configuration up to date and review release notes regularly.

By combining these strategies, you can significantly reduce false positives, tailor security checks per environment, and automate alert handling, improving your security posture without overwhelming your team.

If you want, I can help you draft example dependabot.yml files or GitHub Actions workflows tailored to your monorepo setup.