Written by Brendan Quinn and Yvie Djieya

‍On January 30, 2023 GitHub disclosed that unauthorized users had gained access to repositories that contained encrypted code signing certificates for its Desktop and Atom applications. These certificates were password protected and there is no current evidence of malicious use, according to GitHub, but customers are still advised to take precautions before impacted certificates are deprecated.

As a preventative measure, GitHub will be deprecating the Mac and Windows signing certificates used to sign Desktop app versions 3.0.2-3.1.2 and Atom versions 1.63.0-1.63.1 on Thursday, February 2, 2023. Once deprecated, these certificates can no longer be used to sign code. GitHub recommends updating Desktop and/or downgrading Atom before February 2nd to avoid workflow disruptions.

The following J1 queries can be used to help identify which devices in your environment have the compromised versions of the application installed:

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GitHub Desktop

FIND Application WITH displayName ~= ('GitHub' OR 'Github') AS x 
THAT INSTALLED AS r (Device|Host) AS y 
WHERE r.version = ('3.1.2' OR '3.1.1' OR '3.1.0' OR '3.0.8' OR '3.0.7' OR '3.0.6' OR '3.0.5' OR '3.0.4' OR '3.0.2')
RETURN 
x.displayName AS GitHub_Desktop_App,
r.version AS Compromised_Version,
r._class AS Is, 
y.displayName AS On, 
y.email AS Owned_By

GitHub Atom

FIND Application WITH displayName ~= ('Atom.app') AS x 
THAT INSTALLED AS r (Device|Host) AS y 
WHERE r.version = ('1.63.1' OR '1.63.0')
RETURN 
x.displayName AS GitHub_Desktop_App,
r.version AS Compromised_Version,
r._class AS Is, 
y.displayName AS On, 
y.email AS Owned_By

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