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msd-core/docs/features/improved-prompt-injection-scanner.md
Tom Boucher 1e67ec9737 enhance(#3908): the scanners distinguish an empty diff from one they could not compute (#3937)
* feat(#3908): the scanners distinguish an empty diff from one they could not compute

collect_files ended 2>/dev/null || true, which destroyed the evidence three ways: the redirect discarded git's diagnostic, the pipe replaced git's status with grep's, and || true forced success regardless. Four distinct conditions - an established-empty diff, a bad ref, no repository, and a repository with no commits - all reported clean, and a secret scanner reporting clean because git failed is indistinguishable from an all-clear to any gate consuming it.

git now runs separately from the filter so its status and diagnostic both survive. An established-empty diff exits NO_INPUT; a scope that could not be established exits UNAVAILABLE; the usage sites move off 2 to USAGE. || true is retained on the filter alone, where it is correct: a diff of only images is empty, not failed.

Codes are sourced from a generated shell fragment rather than written into three scripts, so a re-allocation cannot desync them, and a missing fragment fails loudly instead of falling back to literals. The security workflow is updated in the same change: without it, a docs-only PR would newly fail the job.

* fix(#3908): keep scanner stderr out of the file list, and drop try/finally from test bodies

Capturing git and find output with 2>&1 was right for the failure path but wrong for the success path: a warning emitted alongside a successful diff flowed into the file list and was treated as a filename. stderr is now captured separately, forwarded as a warning on success and as the diagnostic on failure, and never folded into the list.

Also converts the control tests' try/finally blocks to t.after(), which CONTRIBUTING bans inside a test body because it masks failures.

* chore(#3908): backfill changeset pr number

* docs(#3908): record the scanners' four-outcome exit contract

SECURITY.md is root-level, so the docs gate correctly held: a Changed fragment owes a file under docs/. The contract also belongs where the feature is described, as REQ-SCAN-INJ-05.

docs/FEATURES.md is GENERATED from per-feature fragments (#3840) - the first edit went into the generated file and gen-features --check caught it, which is the same edit-the-output drift this epic exists to close. The fragment is the source; FEATURES.md is regenerated.

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Co-authored-by: sim <sim@local>
2026-08-27 13:11:13 -04:00

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---
id: 99
title: Improved Prompt Injection Scanner
group: v1.34.0 Features
---
**Hook:** `gsd-prompt-guard.js`, `gsd-read-injection-scanner.js`
**Script:** `scripts/prompt-injection-scan.sh`, `scripts/base64-scan.sh`
**Purpose:** Defense-in-depth detection of prompt injection attempts in planning artifacts and ingested content. Live hooks inline their own pattern subsets for hook independence (they do not import from `security.cts`). The CI scanner (`scanForInjection` in `security.cts`) provides a centralized engine for codebase-wide scanning in tests.
**Requirements:**
- REQ-SCAN-INJ-01: Live hooks MUST detect invisible Unicode characters (zero-width spaces, soft hyphens, Unicode tag block U+E0000–E007F)
- REQ-SCAN-INJ-02: Live hooks MUST detect known injection patterns (instruction override, role manipulation, system-prompt extraction, fake message boundaries). Base64-decode scanning is a CI-time control (`scripts/base64-scan.sh`), not a live hook — live hooks match a base64-exfiltration phrase regex only, they do not decode.
- REQ-SCAN-INJ-03: ~~Scanner MUST apply entropy analysis~~ — Entropy analysis (`scanEntropyAnomalies`) was removed in #2198 as dead code (zero production callers; live hooks do not perform entropy analysis). This requirement is deferred pending a maintainable live implementation.
- REQ-SCAN-INJ-04: Scanner MUST remain advisory-only — detection is logged, not blocking
- REQ-SCAN-INJ-05: A scanner that could not establish its file list MUST NOT report clean (#3908). The CI scanners (`prompt-injection-scan.sh`, `base64-scan.sh`, `secret-scan.sh`) distinguish four outcomes rather than collapsing them into exit 0:
| Outcome | Exit | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| scanned, no findings | `0` | files were in scope and none matched |
| findings | `1` | the scan's own verdict |
| nothing in scope | `NO_INPUT` | the diff resolved and was genuinely empty — e.g. a docs-only PR |
| could not scan | `UNAVAILABLE` | the file list was never established: a bad ref, no repository, or a repository with no commits |
Codes come from the exit-code registry ([ADR-3889](adr/3889-process-exit-contract.md)), sourced from `gsd-core/bin/shared/exit-codes.sh`, never written into the scripts. Every one is non-zero, so a caller written `if ! scanner; then` behaves identically for a clean scan and trips for everything else — this can turn a false green red, never a red green. `.github/workflows/security-scan.yml` treats *nothing in scope* as a pass and *could not scan* as a failure; previously the latter passed silently, having scanned nothing.