Overview of Assured Open Source Software

Assured Open Source Software (Assured OSS) lets you take advantage of the security and experience that Google applies to open source software (OSS) by incorporating the same OSS packages that Google secures and uses into your own developer workflows.

Assured OSS lets you do the following:

  • Obtain your OSS packages from a trusted and known supplier.
  • Know more about package contents with Assured SBOMs that are provided in industry standard formats like SPDX.
  • Know about threats and security of a package with VEX information in a industry-standard format like CycloneDX.
  • Reduce security risk as Google is actively scanning, finding, and fixing new vulnerabilities in curated packages.
  • Increase confidence in the integrity of the OSS you are using through signed, tamper-evident provenance.
  • Choose from more than one thousand of the most popular Java and Python packages, including common machine learning and artificial intelligence projects like TensorFlow, Pandas, and Scikit-learn.

The open-source packages are built by Google in a secure manner. These packages meet Supply-chain Levels for Software Artifacts (SLSA) level 3 requirements and have a verifiable provenance and SBOM.

Assured OSS tiers

Assured OSS has a free tier and a premium tier. The premium tier is available when you purchase Security Command Center Enterprise.

The free tier includes the following:

  • Python and Java open-source packages in curated repositories.
  • Manual setup steps.
  • Curated repositories created in a Google-managed project.
  • Universal proxy endpoints for open-source packages. This proxy lets you download open-source packages and their metadata from one source, whether the packages were built by Google or not.
  • Support for Amazon Web Service (AWS) account access.

The premium tier lets you integrate Assured OSS with Security Command Center Enterprise. It includes the following:

  • Python and Java open-source packages in curated repositories.
  • JavaScript open-source packages in a canonical repository.
  • Automated setup as part of Security Command Center Enterprise activation process.
  • Curated repositories created in a project that you specify.
  • Universal package metadata that is collected and signed by Google. This metadata provides information about the package build, any vulnerabilities, and package health. The package health information is only available for packages that are built by Google.

For more information about Security Command Center Enterprise pricing, see Pricing for the Enterprise tier.

Assured OSS repository options

Assured OSS packages are stored on a Google-managed Artifact Registry repository. You can access and download the open source packages offered by Assured OSS using one of the following methods:

  • Set up a remote (also called a mirror or a proxy) repository in your environment to act as a proxy for the Google-managed Artifact Registry repository. Your developers can connect to the remote repository to download the packages. Use this method if you are using a repository manager like Jfrog Artifactory or Sonatype Nexus.

  • Connect to the Artifact Registry repository directly using a service account. Use this method if developers are using build tools like Maven, Gradle, or pip.

  • Use a virtual upstream repository that acts as a single access point for your developers so that they can download, install, or deploy packages. In the premium tier, two virtual repositories are created automatically: one for Java packages and one for Python packages. In the free tier, you must configure a virtual repository yourself. You can use an Artifact Registry standard repository or an Artifact Registry remote repository as your upstream virtual repository.

The following diagram shows Assured OSS connected to a remote repository.

Connecting to a remote repository.

Software supply chain security

Assured Open Source Software is one of the Google Cloud components you can use to protect your software supply chain. You can use Assured Open Source Software together with other Google Cloud products and features to improve the security posture of developer workflows and tools, software dependencies, CI/CD systems used to build and deploy your software, and runtime environments such as Google Kubernetes Engine and Cloud Run. To learn more, see Software supply chain security.

What's next