mcp-audits 2.0.0

MCP Permission Auditor — scan, enumerate, and risk-score all locally configured MCP servers

mcp-audit

Audit what your AI agents can actually touch.

Every MCP server wired into your editor is a process that can read your files, reach the network, or run shell commands on your behalf — frequently launched from a remote npx/uvx package that can change underneath you. mcp-audit reads the MCP configs already on your machine and tells you what each server can do, how risky it is, whether its tool descriptions hide adversarial instructions, and whether anything changed since you last looked.

Read-only by default: it never edits a config and reports env-var key names only (never values). Use --skip-connect for a zero-touch config-only pass that does not spawn MCP servers or contact remote endpoints; connected scans, package verification, downloads, and LLM analysis make their extra reach explicit in the command.

⚡ 60-second start

No install required — uv runs it in a throwaway environment. This reads the MCP configs already on your machine, connects to each configured server to read its real tool schemas, and flags SSRF-shaped tools:

uvx --from mcp-audits mcp-audit scan --ssrf-check

It stays read-only the whole time — it never edits a config and reports env-var key names only, never values. Sample output:

╭───────────────────── mcp-audit scan ─────────────────────╮
│ Scanned 5 servers across 2 clients. 1 high-risk.         │
│ 0 failed to connect. (2.4s)                              │
╰──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
┏━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━┓
┃ Server     ┃ Client         ┃ Tools ┃ Prompts ┃ Resources ┃ Risk ┃ Non-Tool ┃ Top Permissions            ┃ Status    ┃
┡━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━┩
│ github     │ claude_desktop │    26 │       0 │         0 │  9.4 │ n/a      │ file_write, network, exfil │ connected │
│ filesystem │ claude_desktop │    12 │       0 │         0 │  6.8 │ n/a      │ file_write, file_read      │ connected │
│ memory     │ cursor         │     9 │       0 │         0 │  5.3 │ n/a      │ file_write                 │ connected │
│ fetch      │ cursor         │     1 │       0 │         0 │  3.5 │ n/a      │ network                    │ connected │
│ time       │ claude_desktop │     2 │       0 │         0 │  1.5 │ n/a      │ none                       │ connected │
└────────────┴────────────────┴───────┴─────────┴───────────┴──────┴──────────┴────────────────────────────┴───────────┘

──────────────────────────────── SSRF Warnings ────────────────────────────────
┏━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┓
┃ Server ┃ Type ┃ Target  ┃ Severity ┃ Pattern         ┃ Evidence          ┃ Suggested Action     ┃
┡━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┩
│ fetch  │ tool │ fetch   │ medium   │ url param +     │ url: string       │ Restrict to a host   │
│        │      │         │          │ fetch verb      │ (caller-supplied) │ allowlist; never     │
│        │      │         │          │ (MCP011)        │                   │ proxy caller URLs    │
└────────┴──────┴─────────┴──────────┴─────────────────┴───────────────────┴──────────────────────┘

Sample output with illustrative public server names. Higher risk = a broader surface to sandbox, not "malicious." Want a zero-touch pass first? Add --skip-connect to reason purely from your config — no servers spawned, no network calls. Stack --trifecta-check or --shadow-check alongside --ssrf-check to hunt more attack surfaces, and --json / --sarif / --html to pipe results into CI or a dashboard.

Connected public-fixture demo (fetch, sequential-thinking, time; no auth tokens or workstation configs):

Zero-touch preview against the bundled public fixture:

Install it permanently once you're hooked:

uv tool install mcp-audits                # adds the `mcp-audit` command to your PATH
mcp-audit scan                            # connected scan of every configured client

Drop it into CI in one step — the composite GitHub Action runs the scan and writes SARIF straight to GitHub code scanning:

- uses: saagpatel/MCPAudit@v1.13.1        # config-only by default; optional policy gate exits 2

SARIF proof from the public fixture scan:

Policy gate demo from the same zero-touch public fixture:

Self-contained HTML report preview from a redacted config-only scan:

PyPI package: mcp-audits · installed command: mcp-audit · full flag and detector reference below.

---

External launch checklist

Use this path when sharing MCPAudit outside the repo:

1. Lead with the zero-touch preview image when safety is the point: it is generated from the bundled public fixture with --config-only --skip-connect, so it demonstrates the no-spawn/no-network review path.
2. Use the connected GIF when the audience needs the real tool-schema story: it is recorded from docs/assets/hero-demo-config.json, a curated public fixture that may spawn only the listed no-auth sample servers.
3. Use the SARIF/code-scanning proof when the audience is security or platform engineering: it shows mcp-audit findings uploaded as GitHub code-scanning alerts with stable MCPxxx rule IDs.
4. Use the policy-gate GIF when the audience needs enforcement: it shows the same public fixture failing examples/policies/ci-strict.yaml with exit code 2.
5. Use the HTML report screenshot when the audience needs a shareable artifact preview: it shows scan --html output from a redacted config-only report.
6. Link the trust story: docs/MCP-TRUST-PACKET.md explains how MCPAudit, mcpforge, and local MCP dogfooding relate without overstating any one project.
7. Recruit evidence, not hype: docs/EXTERNAL-FIELD-REPORT-REQUEST.md is the canonical two-minute field-report ask, and docs/FIELD-REPORTS.md#minimal-public-example shows what is safe to paste publicly.
8. Post from the prepared copy: docs/LAUNCH-CONTROL-CARD.md is the single-screen launch cockpit; python scripts/launch_preflight.py --print-hn-copy runs the deterministic go/no-go check and prints the exact HN URL/title/comment, including public README / asset URL checks and PyPI / uvx package checks; launch-posts.md has the Show HN / r/mcp / LinkedIn drafts, title variants, and timing plan; docs/LAUNCH-DAY-RUNBOOK.md has the go/no-go checklist and response routing; docs/LAUNCH-RESPONSE-PLAYBOOK.md has live reply snippets. Keep the line honest: this is pre-beta until two external redacted reports land.

Features

• Capability inventory — catalogs server tools, prompts, and resources; tool, prompt, and resource capabilities are classified across six permission categories: file_read, file_write, network, shell_execution, destructive, exfiltration
• Config-only inference — scan --skip-connect infers conservative risks from declared commands, transports, credential key names, package runners, and remote URLs
• Config health diagnostics — discover and scan flag duplicate server names, conflicting command or URL definitions, missing stdio commands, missing local command paths, project/global scope conflicts, package-runner launches, deprecated SSE transports, shell-wrapper launches, remote endpoints, and credential-heavy configs before users pin or connect; JSON reports include additive config_health_findings
• Risk scoring — composite 0–10 per server as a weighted sum of tool permission categories, with a five-dimension breakdown (file access, network, shell, destructive, exfiltration); prompt/resource findings also produce an additive non_tool_risk signal without changing risk_score.composite
• Stable finding metadata — permission and prompt-injection findings include stable rule IDs, severity, evidence, and suggested remediation so reports are easier to triage
• Local policy gates — scan --policy policy.yaml evaluates reports against local YAML rules and exits nonzero for CI enforcement
• Report redaction — terminal, JSON, SARIF, and HTML report paths share a redaction layer for likely credential values; scan --redact adds an opt-in field-report pass that also scrubs the machine hostname and home-path usernames (/Users/<name>, /home/<name>, C:\Users\<name>) from --json/--sarif/--html output, and replaces server names with stable aliases (server-01, …) everywhere they appear — structured fields, free-text summaries, and command basenames — so a config-only report is safe to share (the field-report checklist stays the backstop for any residual free-text specifics)
• Prompt injection detection — scan --inject-check scans tool, prompt, and resource text for instruction-override patterns, hidden directives, fake role turns, and adversarial phrasing; pattern-based, no LLM required
• SSRF detection — scan --ssrf-check flags tools and resources whose interface lets a caller steer a server-side request target (URL/host params paired with fetch verbs, caller-templated remote resource hosts); static and schema-derived, never issues a request or reads a credential value
• Lethal trifecta detection — scan --trifecta-check detects the canonical agent-exfiltration attack surface: per-server (HIGH, MCP013) when a single server covers all three legs (file_read + untrusted-content ingestion + exfiltration), and fleet-level advisory (MEDIUM, MCP014) when the trifecta assembles only across servers; re-uses inferred permissions, never issues requests or reads credentials
• Tool-name shadowing detection — scan --shadow-check flags cross-server tool-name collisions that could trick an AI agent into routing a call to the wrong server: exact matches (HIGH, MCP015), case/separator-normalised collisions (MEDIUM, MCP016), and homoglyph spoofing via non-ASCII confusable codepoints (HIGH, MCP017); offline, deterministic, no new dependencies
• Schema drift tracking — mcp-audit pin connects to servers and snapshots current tool schemas; subsequent scan --pin-check flags added, removed, and changed tools with plain-language summaries, changed-field hints, suggested actions, and a dry-run refresh workflow for reviewed upgrades. pin --refresh <server> additionally surfaces capability-escalation (MCP018/MCP019) and launch-config/provenance (MCP020–MCP023) deltas in the same preview — unconditionally, so a rug-pull or launch swap can't slip through a baseline refresh
• Capability-escalation ("rug pull") detection — scan --escalation-check compares each tool against its pin baseline and flags security-significant escalations over time: a tool that gained a dangerous capability (MCP018 — HIGH for exfiltration/shell/destructive, MEDIUM for file_write/network) or whose description gained prompt-injection patterns (MCP019, HIGH); pure delta vs the approved baseline, so near-zero false positives. See docs/ESCALATION-DETECTION.md
• Provenance / launch-config drift detection — scan --provenance-check compares a server's launch configuration against its pin baseline to catch supply-chain changes the schema check can't see: command/transport swap (MCP020, HIGH), argument/version drift with dangerous-flag escalation (MCP021, MED/HIGH), HTTP endpoint change (MCP022, HIGH), and credential key-name set changes (MCP023, MEDIUM — key names only, never values). See docs/PROVENANCE-DETECTION.md
• Launch-artifact integrity detection — scan --integrity-check hashes the on-disk artifact a server launches (the resolved command binary + local script args) and flags drift vs the pin baseline (MCP024 — HIGH when the SHA-256 changed, MEDIUM when the file is gone). The command string can stay byte-identical while the file it runs is swapped underneath you; this catches that. Offline and deterministic — only local bytes are hashed, nothing is fetched. Package-runner (npx/uvx) launches hash the runner, not the remote package (see registry verification below). See docs/INTEGRITY-DETECTION.md
• Registry package verification — scan --verify-artifacts (opt-in, network) covers the package-runner case the on-disk check can't: it compares the registry-published hash (npm dist.integrity, PyPI sha256) for the exact pinned package@version against the hash captured at pin time (MCP025 — HIGH on a changed published hash, a republish/tampering signal; MEDIUM when unverifiable). Network is contacted only under --verify-artifacts, on both pin (to capture) and scan (to compare). Covers npm + PyPI. See docs/PACKAGE-VERIFICATION.md
• Byte-level artifact verification — scan --download-artifacts (opt-in, network) goes one level deeper than the published-hash compare: it downloads the actual bytes the registry serves, hashes them, and checks them against both the registry's own published hash and a byte-hash captured at pin time (MCP026). It catches a CDN/mirror/MITM serving bytes inconsistent with the registry's integrity metadata (PUBLISHED_MISMATCH, HIGH) and a pinned file whose bytes changed or vanished (BASELINE_MISMATCH, HIGH); a newly-added file on a frozen version is an advisory MEDIUM, not a false alarm. Downloads stream through bounded hashers, never to disk, only to an allowlist of registry/CDN hosts (re-validated on every redirect hop). Network is contacted only under --download-artifacts, on both pin and scan.
• Multi-client support — reads configs from Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, VSCode, and Windsurf — plus custom paths via --config; use --config-only for isolated scans of one config file
• Structured output — Rich terminal report plus JSON and SARIF 2.1.0 export for ingestion by GitHub Advanced Security and SARIF-aware SAST pipelines, and a self-contained shareable HTML report via scan --html report.html (inline CSS, no JavaScript, redacted and fully HTML-escaped)
• Drop-in CI distribution — a composite GitHub Action (uses: saagpatel/MCPAudit@v2.0.0) runs the scan, writes SARIF, and uploads it to code scanning in one step (config-only by default; optional policy gate exits 2); a pre-commit hook (id: mcp-audit) audits repo-local .mcp.json / .vscode/mcp.json on commit. See docs/ADOPTION-GUIDE.md
• Documented output contract — JSON, SARIF rule IDs, and policy exit codes are documented in docs/OUTPUT-CONTRACT.md
• Watch mode — mcp-audit watch re-scans on config file changes via watchfiles (optional extra: install with mcp-audits[watch])

Quick Start

Prerequisites

• Python 3.11+
• uv (recommended) or pip

Installation

uvx --from mcp-audits mcp-audit discover
# or install permanently:
uv tool install mcp-audits
# with watch mode support:
uv tool install 'mcp-audits[watch]'

Usage

mcp-audit --version

# Discover configured MCP servers without connecting to them
mcp-audit discover

# Scan all configured MCP servers
mcp-audit scan

# Config-only scan that does not spawn or connect to servers
mcp-audit scan --skip-connect

# Filter to specific clients (comma-separated)
mcp-audit scan --clients claude_desktop,cursor

# Scan only one explicit MCP config file
mcp-audit scan --config ./mcp.json --config-only

# Check tools, prompts, and resources for prompt-injection patterns
mcp-audit scan --inject-check

# Flag SSRF-prone tools/resources (caller-controlled server-side fetch targets)
mcp-audit scan --ssrf-check

# Suppress SSRF findings whose fixed target host is trusted (caller-controlled targets are never suppressed)
mcp-audit scan --ssrf-check --ssrf-allowlist api.github.com,internal.svc

# Detect lethal-trifecta / toxic-flow attack surface (per-server and fleet-level)
mcp-audit scan --trifecta-check

# Detect cross-server tool-name shadowing (exact, normalised, homoglyph collisions)
mcp-audit scan --shadow-check

# Pin current tool schemas, then detect drift on later scans.
# Pinning connects to servers so it can capture real tool schemas.
mcp-audit pin
mcp-audit pin --status
mcp-audit pin --status --json
mcp-audit pin --stale
mcp-audit pin --stale --json
mcp-audit scan --pin-check

# Review expected drift for one server before refreshing its baseline.
mcp-audit pin --refresh github
mcp-audit pin --refresh github --json
mcp-audit pin --refresh github --apply

# Detect capability escalation ("rug pull") vs the pin baseline (implies a pin comparison).
# A tool that gained a dangerous capability, or a description that gained injection patterns.
mcp-audit scan --escalation-check

# Detect launch-config / provenance drift vs the pin baseline (command, args, URL, credential keys).
mcp-audit scan --provenance-check

# Detect on-disk launch-artifact (binary/script) hash drift vs the pin baseline.
mcp-audit scan --integrity-check

# Verify npm/PyPI package@version registry hashes vs the pin baseline (opt-in, network).
mcp-audit pin --verify-artifacts        # capture registry hashes into the baseline
mcp-audit scan --verify-artifacts       # compare on later scans

# Download the artifact bytes and verify their hash vs published + baseline (opt-in, network).
mcp-audit pin --download-artifacts      # capture byte-hashes into the baseline
mcp-audit scan --download-artifacts     # download + verify on later scans

# Export JSON or SARIF 2.1.0, or a single-file shareable HTML report
mcp-audit scan --json audit.json --sarif audit.sarif
mcp-audit scan --html audit.html

# Field-report mode: scrub hostname + home-path usernames from file output (opt-in)
mcp-audit scan --skip-connect --json field-report.json --redact

# Fail CI on local policy violations
mcp-audit scan --policy policy.yaml

# Optional LLM-assisted classification (requires ANTHROPIC_API_KEY)
mcp-audit scan --llm-analysis

# Watch mode — re-scan on config change; use --skip-connect for config-only watching
mcp-audit watch

Help validate the beta (2 minutes)

mcp-audit needs two external, redacted, config-only field reports before it takes a beta label. If you run MCP servers, contributing one stays fully offline — no servers spawned, no network:

python3 -m pip install --upgrade mcp-audits
mcp-audit --version
mcp-audit scan --skip-connect --json mcp-audit-field-report.json --redact

--redact auto-scrubs the machine hostname, home-path usernames, and server names for you. Then open a redacted field report — the template walks you through the safe fields. Please still redact credential values and any proprietary prompt/tool/schema text; docs/EXTERNAL-FIELD-REPORT-REQUEST.md has the full checklist, and docs/FIELD-REPORTS.md#minimal-public-example shows a safe example shape. For a reference of what the scanner reports on real software, see the solo field scan in docs/FIELD-SCAN-POPULAR-SERVERS.md. For an end-to-end generator-to-auditor demo packet, see docs/MCP-TRUST-PACKET.md.

Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Language	Python 3.11+
CLI	Click 8
Output	Rich
MCP protocol	mcp SDK 1.27+
Validation	Pydantic v2
Config parsing	PyYAML + json5
Watch mode	watchfiles (optional extra)
Optional LLM	Anthropic SDK

Architecture

The scanner enumerates MCP client config files, connects to each configured server, and calls tools/list, prompts/list, and resources/list over the MCP protocol when those capabilities are available. Stdio servers are started as subprocesses via anyio; HTTP/SSE servers are contacted at their configured URL. Returned tool schemas, prompt arguments, and resource URIs flow into the permission classifier (schema walker + regex ruleset over six permission categories) and the optional injection detector (pattern ruleset for instruction-override, role-switch, and hidden-directive phrasing). The risk scorer composes a per-category weighted sum clamped to 0–10 from tool findings, then separately reports additive non_tool_risk for prompt and resource capability or injection findings. non_tool_risk is for triage and output consumers; it does not change risk_score.composite. Reports render via Rich; JSON and SARIF 2.1.0 export are first-class. The pin store serializes SHA256 schema hashes plus reviewable tool snapshots to ~/.mcp-audit-pins.yaml for actionable drift detection on subsequent --pin-check scans. Use mcp-audit pin --refresh <server> to preview expected drift for one reviewed server — including capability-escalation and launch-config/provenance deltas vs the baseline — then rerun with --apply to replace that server's pins. Use mcp-audit pin --stale to review pinned servers that are no longer present in discovered MCP configs before clearing them explicitly with mcp-audit pin --clear <server>.

Local Policy Gates

Policies are local YAML files evaluated after a scan. A failing policy exits with code 2 after terminal, JSON, or SARIF output is written.

fail_on:
  severity: high
  injection: medium
  capabilities: medium
  config_health: medium
  drift: true
require:
  pins:
    servers:
      - github
deny:
  permissions:
    - shell_execution
max_risk: 7
allow_servers:
  - github
servers:
  github:
    max_risk: 5
    deny:
      permissions:
        - shell_execution

See docs/ADOPTION-GUIDE.md for local review, team CI, and GitHub code scanning setup paths. See docs/1.1-ADOPTION.md for non_tool_risk parsing examples and policy selection notes, and examples/consumers/ for runnable JSON consumer examples. See examples/policies/ for starter policies. See docs/GOLDEN-ROLLOUT.md for the recommended config-only to policy-gated rollout path. See docs/STABLE-READINESS.md for the stable-release bar. See docs/PIN-MAINTENANCE.md for reviewed pin refresh and stale server cleanup workflows. See docs/PROMPT-RESOURCE-SCORING.md and docs/SCORING-MIGRATION.md for the current prompt/resource scoring boundary and migration path. See docs/COMPOSITE-SCORING-PROPOSAL.md for the future combined-score proposal. See examples/ci/pin-stale-review.yml and examples/maintenance/stale-pin-review.sh for routine stale pin review flows. See docs/FEEDBACK-TO-FIXTURES.md for turning false positives, missing detections, output issues, and pin lifecycle feedback into safe regression fixtures. See docs/FIELD-REPORTS.md for the redacted field-report evidence path, minimal public example shape, public field-report issue template, and consumer-contract coverage. See docs/MCP-TRUST-PACKET.md for the public MCP ecosystem demo path that pairs mcpforge scaffolding with MCPAudit review output. See docs/SOLO-EVIDENCE.md for solo multi-environment evidence that can reduce release risk without replacing external reports. See docs/ROADMAP-NEXT.md for the current post-1.5.5 roadmap. See docs/1.5-EVIDENCE-INTAKE.md for the current evidence-led 1.5 planning track. See docs/BETA-READINESS-EVIDENCE.md for the beta-readiness evidence and release decision. External beta-evidence reports are tracked in https://github.com/saagpatel/MCPAudit/milestone/4. See docs/EXTERNAL-FIELD-REPORT-REQUEST.md for the copy-paste contributor request, and docs/EXTERNAL-OUTREACH-MESSAGES.md for direct outreach messages.

License

MIT