Most compose files start as a quick experiment and end up in production. Along the way, a few things creep in: a database published on every network interface, a password written straight into environment:, an image tagged latest, a container mounted on the Docker socket. Nobody decides these on purpose; they survive because nobody rereads the file.
I wrote a small Hermes skill, docker-compose-auditor, that does the line-by-line read. It is one standard-library Python file with a tiny YAML reader built in, so there is nothing to install.
It reports findings by severity: high for exposed datastores, literal secrets, privileged mode and Docker socket mounts; medium for unpinned images and undeclared volumes; low for missing restart policies and healthchecks. It exits with code 1 when something serious is found, so it works as a CI gate.
python3 scripts/compose_audit.py docker-compose.yml
# [HIGH ] db exposed-datastore Port 5432:5432 (PostgreSQL) is published on all interfaces...
# [MEDIUM] web latest-tag Image 'nginx:latest' uses the 'latest' tag...
A reference like ${DB_PASSWORD} is accepted as safe; a literal value is not.
It has limits, and the skill says so: secret detection is based on variable names, and anchors, merge keys and include are not resolved. It is a quick first pass, not a replacement for a proper security review.
Skill (MIT): https://github.com/RobinBeraud/hermes-skills/tree/main/devops/docker-compose-auditor
All skills: https://github.com/RobinBeraud/hermes-skills
This post was written with AI assistance and reviewed through automated checks.
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