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Rule Reference

SEC369lintai-ai-securitystableclaude_settingswarn

Claude settings: wildcard Write permissions

Claude settings permissions allow `Write(*)` in a shared committed config

Provider
lintai-ai-security
Surface
claude_settings
Scope
per_file
Tier
stable
Severity
warn
Confidence
high
Detection
structural
Remediation
message_only

Activation Model

Preset Membership

This rule is part of the builtin activation graph through these preset memberships.

previewmembership
claudemembership

Lifecycle

Stable Lifecycle Contract

State

stable_gated

Graduation rationale

Checks shared Claude settings permissions for explicit wildcard `Write(*)` grants.

Deterministic signal basis

ClaudeSettingsSignals exact string detection for `Write(*)` inside permissions.allow on parsed Claude settings JSON.

Malicious corpus
claude-settings-write-wildcard
Benign corpus
claude-settings-write-specific-safe
structured evidence required remediation reviewed
Canonical note

Structural stable rule intended as a high-precision check with deterministic evidence.

Nearby Signals

Related Rules

SEC362Claude settings: wildcard Bash permissionsClaude settings permissions allow `Bash(*)` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable
SEC364Claude settings: bypassPermissions default modeClaude settings set `permissions.defaultMode` to `bypassPermissions` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable
SEC367Claude settings: wildcard WebFetch permissionsClaude settings permissions allow `WebFetch(*)` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable
SEC372Claude settings: wildcard Read permissionsClaude settings permissions allow `Read(*)` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable
SEC373Claude settings: wildcard Edit permissionsClaude settings permissions allow `Edit(*)` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable
SEC374Claude settings: wildcard WebSearch permissionsClaude settings permissions allow `WebSearch(*)` in a shared committed configclaude_settingsstable

Why It Matters ​

SEC369 flags committed Claude settings files when permissions.allow contains the exact wildcard write grant Write(*).

This is useful because:

  • shared .claude/settings.json files often become team-wide policy by copy/paste
  • Write(*) grants broad file modification power instead of a reviewed allowlist
  • broad write access is much harder to defend in code review than scoped patterns tied to known repo paths

What Triggers ​

This rule applies only to committed Claude settings surfaces:

  • .claude/settings.json
  • claude/settings.json

It triggers when:

  • permissions.allow contains the exact string Write(*)

It does not trigger on:

  • narrower reviewed patterns such as Write(./artifacts/**)
  • fixture-like test/example paths

Examples ​

Bad:

json
{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": ["Write(*)", "Read(*)"]
  }
}

Better:

json
{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": ["Write(./artifacts/**)", "Read(*)"]
  }
}

Remediation ​

  • replace Write(*) with specific reviewed write patterns
  • keep shared write permissions scoped to the smallest set of repo paths the workflow actually needs