How to integrate Bearer CLI into GitHub Actions?

Use the provided install script or Docker image in your workflow YAML. For example, add a step to run 'bearer scan' on your code directory, and configure it to fail on critical findings for CI checks.

Bearer vs SonarQube for security scanning?

Bearer specializes in prioritizing risks based on sensitive data flows and offers privacy reports, while SonarQube provides broader code quality metrics. Bearer is better for compliance-focused teams, whereas SonarQube covers more overall code health aspects.

Does Bearer scan for dependency vulnerabilities?

No, Bearer CLI is a SAST tool that analyzes source code for security flaws and data flows. It does not perform software composition analysis (SCA); you need a separate tool like OWASP Dependency-Check for dependency scanning.

How to reduce false positives in Bearer scans?

Configure scans by skipping specific rules with the --skip-rule flag or using custom rules. The documentation recommends adjusting sensitivity settings and leveraging the privacy-focused prioritization to filter noise.

Bearer CLI free vs paid version differences?

Bearer CLI is open-source and covers seven languages with basic SAST and privacy scanning. Bearer Pro adds advanced cross-file analysis, support for languages like C# and Kotlin, and enhanced reporting, available through Cycode's commercial offering.

How long does a Bearer scan take on a large codebase?

Scans typically range from 20 seconds to a few minutes, similar to running a test suite. For CI, use diff scanning to only analyze new changes, which speeds up the process significantly.

Open-Awesome

Bearer

NOASSERTIONGov2.0.1

A static application security testing (SAST) tool that scans source code to discover, filter, and prioritize security and privacy risks.

Visit Website GitHub

2.6k stars143 forks0 contributors

What is Bearer?

Bearer is a static application security testing (SAST) tool that scans source code to identify security vulnerabilities and privacy risks. It analyzes data flows to detect issues like injection flaws, sensitive data exposure, and misconfigurations, prioritizing findings based on their potential impact. The tool supports multiple programming languages and integrates into development workflows to provide early feedback.

Target Audience

Development and security teams building applications in supported languages (Go, Java, JavaScript, TypeScript, PHP, Python, Ruby) who need automated security and privacy scanning within their CI/CD pipelines.

Value Proposition

Bearer reduces alert fatigue by prioritizing risks related to sensitive data exposure, offers both security and privacy scanning in one tool, and provides a developer-friendly experience with fast scans and clear, actionable reports.

Overview

Code security scanning tool (SAST) to discover, filter and prioritize security and privacy risks.

Use Cases

Best For

Scanning code for OWASP Top 10 and CWE Top 25 vulnerabilities
Detecting sensitive data flows (PII, PHI) for GDPR compliance
Integrating security checks into CI/CD pipelines for early feedback
Generating privacy reports for impact assessments (DPIA, RoPA)
Prioritizing security findings based on data breach risk
Checking multi-language codebases for common security flaws

Not Ideal For

Projects requiring advanced interprocedural analysis for languages other than Java or Python without purchasing Bearer Pro
Teams needing security scanning for niche languages like C# or Kotlin, which are only supported in the commercial version
Organizations seeking a fully open-source SAST tool with no feature restrictions compared to paid tiers

Pros & Cons

Pros

Data-Centric Risk Prioritization

Prioritizes findings based on sensitive data exposure like PII and PHI, reducing alert fatigue by focusing on critical OWASP and CWE vulnerabilities first.

Broad Language Support

Covers seven popular languages including Go, Java, and Python in the open-source version, making it suitable for diverse web application stacks.

Privacy Compliance Automation

Generates automated reports for GDPR compliance (e.g., DPIA, RoPA) by detecting over 120 sensitive data types and components processing data.

Developer-Friendly Integration

Offers fast scans, clear output with progress bars, and easy CI/CD setup via Docker or install scripts, as shown in the getting started guide.

Cons

Advanced Features Behind Paywall

Cross-file and interprocedural analysis—key for accurate vulnerability detection—are only fully available in Bearer Pro for limited languages like Java and Python.

Limited Open-Source Language Coverage

The free version lacks support for languages like C#, Kotlin, and Elixir, which are reserved for the commercial offering, forcing upgrades for multi-language teams.

SAST-Inherent False Positives

As admitted in the FAQs, false positives are possible despite modern techniques, requiring manual triage and potentially slowing down development workflows.

Frequently Asked Questions

Related Projects

Checkov

Prevent cloud misconfigurations and find vulnerabilities during build-time in infrastructure as code, container images and open source packages with Checkov by Bridgecrew.

Stars8,658

Forks1,324

Last commit3 days ago

TFSec

Tfsec is now part of Trivy

Stars6,987

Forks556

Last commit1 month ago

KICS

Find security vulnerabilities, compliance issues, and infrastructure misconfigurations early in the development cycle of your infrastructure-as-code with KICS by Checkmarx.

Stars2,619

Forks363

Last commit2 days ago

Community-curated · Updated weekly · 100% open source

Found a gem we're missing?

Open-Awesome is built by the community, for the community. Submit a project, suggest an awesome list, or help improve the catalog on GitHub.

Submit a project Star on GitHub