A new CISO ordered a full NHI audit. The result: 3,400 active credentials, 60% with no identifiable owner. Can't revoke them, can't rotate them, can't assign responsibility.
An organization's core credentials sat in public repositories for years. The security industry's answer: "Out of scope."
A single Stripe API key was copied to 14 locations over three years. When a QA repo went public, the key was exposed — and revoking it meant breaking 14 services simultaneously.
A single AWS key, never rotated for 3 years, spread across 7 systems. When a supply chain attack hit a Terraform CI plugin, the key gave attackers full infrastructure access. Inside the Aged Key kill chain and how to defend against long-lived credentials.
A departed developer's AWS key stayed active for 92 days. When an infostealer hit their personal laptop, the key was sold on the dark web. Inside the Ghost Key kill chain and how to defend against orphaned credentials.
A .env file pushed to a public GitHub repo is found by attacker bots in 4 minutes. We map the full kill chain — from credential exposure to infrastructure compromise and show how to detect and respond before the damage is done.
A prompt injection in a GitHub Issue title hijacked Cline's AI triage bot, stole npm tokens, and silently installed a rogue AI agent on 4,000 developer machines. The era of AI-installing-AI supply chain attacks has arrived.
API Keys Traded on the Dark Web: Hackers's New Target