Description

Anchore is a container inspection and analytics platform that enables operators to analyze, inspect, perform security scans, and evaluate custom policies against container images. The Anchore plugin can be used in a Pipeline job or added as a build step to a Freestyle job to automate the process of running an anchore analysis, evaluating custom anchore policies against images, and performing image anchore security scans. 

Anchore Jenkins Plugin

Anchore has been designed to plug seamlessly into the CI/CD workflow. A developer commits code into the source code management system. This change triggers Jenkins to start a build which creates a container image.

In the typical workflow this container image is then run through automated testing. If an image does not meet your organization’s requirements for security or compliance then it makes little sense to invest the time required to perform automated tests on the image, it would be better to “learn fast” by failing the build and returning the appropriate reports back to the developer to allow the issue to be addressed.

Plugin Modes

Before getting started, one of two plugin operating 'modes' must be selected. Selecting a mode will configure the plugin to either use a direct anchore scanner (which must be installed on each Jenkins worker node), or a second mode which configures the plugin to interact with the Anchore Engine service API (where the Anchore engine has been installed with its service API accessible from the worker nodes). Depending on which mode you select, the initial configuration/usage will differ.

Anchore Engine Mode (recommended)

In this mode, the usage model generally conforms to the following flow:

1. A Jenkins job will build a container image, and push the image to a registry that is pre-configured in the anchore engine service (see pre-requisites below)
2. The anchore build step will interact with the anchore engine by 'adding' the image (which instructs the anchore engine to pull the image from the registry), and then performing a policy evaluation check on the image. The build step can optionally be configured to fail the build if the policy evaluation results in a 'STOP' action.
3. the plugin will store the resulting policy evaluation results with the job, for later inspection/review

The plugin can be used in Freestyle and Pipeline jobs.

Pre-Requisites:

1. The anchore engine service must be installed within your environment, with its service API being accessible from all Jenkins workers. See https://github.com/anchore/anchore-engine to get started 
2. A docker registry must exist and be configured within anchore engine, as the plugin will be instructing the anchore engine to pull images from a registry in this mode.
3. All authentication credentials/anchore engine API endpoint information must be available as input to the plugin at configuration time.

Anchore Local Mode (deprecated)

Local mode is deprecated and is included for backwards compatibility. Future releases of the Anchore Jenkins plugin will remove support for Local Mode. All new deployments should use Engine Mode. The following installation instructions covers the installation and configuration of the Anchore Jenkins plugin in Engine mode.

In this mode, the usage model generally conforms to the following flow:

1. A Jenkins job will build a container image on some worker node, and the name of the locally available image is written to a file (default anchore_images)
2. The anchore build step will read the images from the anchore_images file and perform analysis/policy evaluation, by calling out to a locally running container with anchore pre-installed (see pre-requisites in the guide linked below). The build step can optionally be configured to fail the build if the policy evaluation results in a 'STOP' action.
3. The plugin will store the resulting policy evaluation and image query results with the job, for later inspection/review

Pre-Requisites:

1. Jenkins installed and configured either as a single system, or with multiple configured jenkins worker nodes
2. Each host on which jenkins jobs will run must have docker installed and the jenkins user (or whichever user you have configured jenkins to run jobs as) must be allowed to interact with docker (either directly or via sudo)
3. Each host on which jenkins jobs will run must have the latest anchore container image installed in the local docker host. To install, run 'docker pull anchore/jenkins:latest' on each jenkins host to make the image available to the plugin. The plugin will start an instance of the anchore/jenkins:latest docker container named 'jenkins_anchore' by default, on each host that runs a jenkins job that includes an anchore container image scanner build step.

Once installed, one of two 'modes' must be selected (Manage Jenkins -> Configure System -> Anchore Plugin Mode), which will configure the plugin to either use a direct anchore scanner (which must be installed on each Jenkins worker node), or a second mode which configures the plugin to interact with the anchore engine service API (where the anchore engine has been installed with its service API accessible from the worker nodes). Depending on which mode you select, the initial configuration/usage will differ.

Installation

The Anchore plugin has been published in the Jenkins plugin registry and is available for installation on any Jenkins server.

From the main Jenkins menu select Manage Jenkins

Next select Manage Plugins

TAG=$(date "+%H%M%S%d%m%Y")
IMAGENAME=build.example.com/myapp
docker build -t $IMAGENAME:$TAG .
docker push $IMAGENAME:$TAG

TAG=$(date "+%H%M%S%d%m%Y")
IMAGENAME=build.example.com/myapp
docker build -t $IMAGENAME:$TAG .
docker push $IMAGENAME:$TAG

# Line added to create anchore_images file
echo "$IMAGENAME:$TAG ${WORKSPACE}/Dockerfile " > anchore_images

node {
  def imageLine = 'debian:latest'
  writeFile file: 'anchore_images', text: imageLine
  anchore name: 'anchore_images'
}