io.github.KazKozDev/footnote-mcp

What we checked

Six static checks, weighted by risk. Every result reflects only what could be observed in the published package and repository — never intent.

• Injection surface

  unscannable25% of grade

  Tool descriptions/manifest scanned for instruction-injection patterns (imperatives at the model, hidden text, 'ignore previous', data-exfil URLs).

  No tool descriptions, server instructions, prompts, or resources were fetched; nothing to scan for injection.

• Supply chain

  pass25% of grade

  Package provenance: namespace verification, repo linkage, maintainer count, account age, postinstall scripts, typosquat distance.

  Python build script has no build-time network/exec; repository linkage verified

• Credential hygiene

  pass15% of grade

  How the server takes secrets (env vs plaintext config vs hardcoded); secrets appearing in tool schemas.

  Reads secrets from the environment (e.g. src/footnote_mcp/diagnostics.py) — the recommended intake shape. PASS = no static red flag; static analysis cannot prove the code honors env-based secret handling at runtime.

• Permission scope

  warn15% of grade

  Declared tools vs. breadth (filesystem, network, exec); flags shell-exec and unbounded filesystem access.

  has both shell/exec and network egress — capable of download-and-run, though no such path was observed (src/footnote_mcp/tools_data/sandbox.py: subprocess.* call; src/footnote_mcp/http_server.py: outbound HTTP/socket call). discloses shell/exec capability: src/footnote_mcp/tools_data/sandbox.py: subprocess.* call Capability DISCLOSURE, not a verdict: static analysis sees the primitive is present and reachable, not whether its use is attacker-controlled.

• Version behavior

  fail10% of grade

  Diff of tool definitions between versions; new permissions or changed descriptions in a patch release (the postmark-mcp class).

  vs prior 0.2.5 (patch bump): new capability primitive(s) in source: child_process, fs-write, http-client, subprocess; new hardcoded outbound host/BCC destination(s): 127.0.0.1, a.com, a.gov, api.crossref.org, api.firecrawl.dev, api.github.com, api.search.brave.com, api.tavily.com, app.scrapingbee.com, archive.org, arxiv.org, b.com, b.org, bing.com, data.commoncrawl.org, data.gov, ddg.com, doi.org, example.com, example.substack.com, export.arxiv.org, footnote-mcp.onrender.com, footnote.test, github.com, host, html.duckduckgo.com, index.commoncrawl.org, other.com, p1, p2, query.wikidata.org, reddit.com, searx.test, site.com, t.com, this-domain-does-not-exist-12345.com, web.archive.org, www.bing.com, www.googleapis.com, www.iana.org, www.w3.org, www.wikidata.org, x.com.

• Transport config

  unscannable10% of grade

  Remote servers: TLS and auth mode (none/token/OAuth). Local servers: whether the manifest indicates it phones home.

  local stdio server: no remote transport or auth surface, and no phone-home/telemetry signal found in source. Absence of transport findings is NOT a safety guarantee — phone-home hosts can be constructed at runtime and defeat static analysis.