Cosign

Passwordless Kubernetes Image Pulling with Artifact Keeper via ServiceAccount Tokens

Kubernetes 1.34 and later enables kubelet to forward a pod's ServiceAccount token to an external image credential provider plugin, allowing the plugin to exchange it for short-lived read-only credentials from a compatible registry. Artifact Keeper, an open-source Rust-based OCI and package registry, implements an OIDC provider that validates these tokens and issues temporary credentials without requiring imagePullSecrets in manifests. The approach follows zero-trust principles by eliminating long-lived secrets that can leak across namespaces or clusters. A custom credential provider binary handles the token exchange, enforces audience restrictions, and redacts sensitive data from logs. The solution requires specific ClusterRole permissions for nodes, kubelet flags, and registry-side OIDC mappings that bind Kubernetes namespaces to read-only groups. Testing on kind 1.34.3 confirmed successful pulls for authorized ServiceAccounts and clear 401 errors for unauthorized ones when imagePullPolicy is set to Always.

Container Image Risks: Why Skipping Verification Today Breaks Your Service Tomorrow

Technical leader Nikita from Cloud.ru details four recurring container security failures observed across client environments. The article examines untracked vulnerabilities in high-privilege components such as the NVIDIA GPU operator, supply-chain compromises affecting even trusted tools like Trivy, persistent secret leakage patterns, and CI/CD pipeline exposure. Real incidents include a 2025 NVIDIA container toolkit exploit that enabled lateral movement to worker nodes and a 2026 Trivy GitHub compromise that poisoned over seventy image tags. The author stresses that pinning to image tags is insufficient and recommends full SHA256 hashes, private registries with caching, Cosign signatures validated by Kyverno or Connaisseur, and pre-commit secret scanning. Practical recommendations include automated CVE notifications and immediate patching of privileged components rather than waiting for sprint cycles.