Device Protection in CircleCI

CircleCI jobs run on Linux executors, so Device Protection installs the same way it does on any Linux machine. What is specific to CircleCI is where the install goes: once on a self-hosted runner that stays around, or inside each job on the Docker and machine executors.

Read Install Device Protection for Linux first for the token and the install flavors. The job-level snippets below use the container flavor, which Device Protection in Containers explains.

Docker and machine executors

Add your Device Protection token as a project environment variable, or to a context, named AIKIDO_TOKEN. Then define a reusable command and run it first in each job:

.circleci/config.yml

version: 2.1

commands:
  start-device-protection:
    steps:
      - run:
          name: Start Device Protection
          command: |
            curl -fsSL https://github.com/AikidoSec/safe-chain/raw/refs/heads/main/install-scripts/install-endpoint-linux.sh \
              | sudo AIKIDO_TOKEN="$AIKIDO_TOKEN" sh -s -- --container
            sudo aikido-endpoint-protection-start --wait-for-healthy
            echo 'for f in /etc/profile.d/aikido-*.sh; do . "$f"; done' >> "$BASH_ENV"

jobs:
  build:
    docker:
      - image: cimg/node:lts
    steps:
      - checkout
      - start-device-protection
      - run: npm ci

workflows:
  build:
    jobs:
      - build

• Pass the token after sudo. sudo drops the rest of your environment. On an image that runs as root without sudo, drop both sudo prefixes.

• The $BASH_ENV line covers every later step. CircleCI sources that file at the start of each run step.

• The runner is a VM, but it takes --container. A job cannot reboot the runner, and container mode needs no reboot. That is also why the agent is started explicitly. See Choose the install flavor.

Self-hosted runners

Install the agent on the runner host with --headless, then reboot. See Install Device Protection for Linux.

Verify it works

.circleci/config.yml

      - run:
          name: Verify Device Protection
          command: curl -sS -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}\n" --max-time 15 https://registry.npmjs.org/safe-chain-test/-/safe-chain-test-0.0.1-security.tgz

403 means the agent blocked the malware test package. 200 means the download skipped the agent.

Troubleshooting

Problem	Fix
Token is required	The job cannot see the variable. Check the job uses the right context. Fork pull requests get no variables by default
Root privileges required	Prefix the install and the start command with sudo
Test package returns 200, or SELF_SIGNED_CERT_IN_CHAIN	The step does not run in bash, so it skips $BASH_ENV. Source /etc/profile.d/aikido-*.sh in that step