From dd8da2a6f450ed375f4478ce3a8af91087667a55 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Divit Mittal <64.69.76.69.74.m@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 7 Jul 2026 04:57:00 +0530
Subject: [PATCH] docs(security): add vulnerability policy

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 SECURITY.md | 43 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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 create mode 100644 SECURITY.md

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+# Security Policy
+
+Thank you for helping keep CiteStage and its users safe.
+
+## Supported Versions
+
+CiteStage is currently a research/MVP artifact. Security fixes are accepted for the `main` branch and the latest tagged release, if one exists.
+
+## Reporting a Vulnerability
+
+Please do not report security vulnerabilities through public GitHub issues.
+
+To report a vulnerability, contact the maintainer directly by email or open a private GitHub security advisory if the repository has advisories enabled. Include:
+
+- A concise description of the issue and its impact.
+- Steps to reproduce, proof-of-concept corpus/query data, or affected files.
+- Whether the issue can expose private corpus material, traces, generated reports, local files, or CI credentials.
+- Any suggested mitigation or patch, if available.
+
+The maintainer will acknowledge reports as soon as possible and coordinate a fix or disclosure timeline based on severity.
+
+## Security Expectations
+
+- Never commit secrets, private corpora, private traces, generated reports with sensitive excerpts, or `.env` files.
+- Keep fixture-based evaluation deterministic and safe to run locally and in CI.
+- Redact sensitive corpus excerpts from bug reports, screenshots, traces, and diagnosis output.
+- Treat StageTrace JSON, repair plans, and report artifacts as potentially sensitive when they come from private documentation.
+- Prefer least-privilege GitHub tokens and CI permissions when adding workflows or integrations.
+
+## Scope
+
+In scope:
+
+- Secret exposure in examples, corpora, traces, reports, logs, or CI output.
+- Unsafe handling of private corpus content or generated diagnosis artifacts.
+- Vulnerabilities in CLI behavior that can overwrite unexpected files, read secrets, or mis-handle untrusted corpus input.
+- Supply-chain concerns in build, Nix, Cargo, or APM metadata.
+
+Out of scope:
+
+- Publicly known dependency advisories without a CiteStage-specific exploit path.
+- Findings that require malicious local shell access beyond the repository's documented command surface.
+- Availability-only reports against public services not controlled by this project.