Implementing Sigstore for Software Signing

When to Use

• Signing container images and software artifacts without managing long-lived cryptographic keys
• Establishing verifiable provenance for build outputs in CI/CD pipelines using OIDC identity binding
• Querying the Rekor transparency log to audit when and by whom an artifact was signed
• Verifying that container images pulled from registries were signed by authorized identities and issuers
• Integrating Sigstore verification into Kubernetes admission controllers to enforce signed-image policies

Do not use for signing artifacts that require air-gapped or offline signing workflows where OIDC authentication is unavailable, for environments that cannot reach the public Sigstore infrastructure (Fulcio, Rekor) and have no private instance deployed, or as a replacement for traditional PGP/GPG signing where regulatory compliance mandates specific key management procedures.

Prerequisites

• Cosign CLI v2.4+ installed (go install github.com/sigstore/cosign/v2/cmd/cosign@latest or binary release)
• Access to an OIDC identity provider supported by Fulcio (Google, GitHub, Microsoft, or a custom OIDC issuer)
• Container registry credentials (for signing container images) with push access to store signature objects
• Python 3.9+ with sigstore, requests, and cryptography packages for the automation agent
• Network access to fulcio.sigstore.dev, rekor.sigstore.dev, and tuf-repo-cdn.sigstore.dev (or private Sigstore instance URLs)