--- title: GitHub Actions Native Egress Firewall vs. Harden-Runner:... description: GitHub is rolling out a native egress firewall for GitHub-hosted Actions runners, and StepSecurity compares it with its own Harden-Runner agent. The native... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/github-actions-native-egress-firewall-vs-harden-runner-five-differences-that-matter-zti0whcu6 twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: GitHub Actions Native Egress Firewall vs. Harden-Runner: Five Differences That Matter | daily.dev og:description: GitHub is rolling out a native egress firewall for GitHub-hosted Actions runners, and StepSecurity compares it with its own Harden-Runner agent. The native... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/github-actions-native-egress-firewall-vs-harden-runner-five-differences-that-matter-zti0whcu6 og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/ZTi0WHcU6.png og:image:alt: GitHub Actions Native Egress Firewall vs. Harden-Runner: Five Differences That Matter og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # GitHub Actions Native Egress Firewall vs. Harden-Runner: Five Differences That Matter **[StepSecurity](https://daily.dev/sources/stepsecurity)** · 6 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary GitHub is rolling out a native egress firewall for GitHub-hosted Actions runners, and StepSecurity compares it with its own Harden-Runner agent. The native firewall currently covers only GitHub-hosted Linux runners, while Harden-Runner supports Linux, Windows, and macOS on both GitHub-hosted and self-hosted runners. Harden-Runner has protected more than 19,000 open-source projects through its Community tier and has detected real attacks including tj-actions/changed-files, Nx, and Sha1-Hulud. Beyond network allowlisting, it adds anomaly detection with baselines, a threat intelligence Global Block List that works even in audit mode, file-write monitoring to help identify unexpected source changes during builds, and centralized dashboards for tracking registry migrations. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### Does GitHub's native egress firewall for Actions work on self-hosted runners? No, the native egress firewall preview only supports GitHub-hosted Linux runners. It does not cover Windows or macOS runners, nor self-hosted infrastructure. Harden-Runner, by contrast, supports Linux, Windows, and macOS across both GitHub-hosted and self-hosted runners, including deployments via Actions Runner Controller on Kubernetes, virtual machines, and bare-metal servers. _Weighing runner security options? daily.dev surfaces comparisons like GitHub Actions firewall versus Harden-Runner._ ### How was the tj-actions/changed-files supply chain attack detected? The compromised action contacted gist.githubusercontent.com to download a script that read secrets from runner memory and printed them into workflow logs. Harden-Runner flagged the destination because it differed from the workflow's established behavioral baseline, even though the domain itself was a familiar GitHub-owned hosting service that an allowlist would likely permit. _Tracking CI/CD supply chain incidents is easier with daily.dev's coverage of attacks like tj-actions/changed-files._ ### Can an egress firewall alone detect build tampering like the SolarWinds attack? No, an egress firewall cannot detect it because the SUNSPOT malware in the SolarWinds breach replaced a source file during compilation to insert a backdoor, then restored the original file afterward, without making any new outbound network connection. Detecting this requires file-write monitoring during the build, not just network traffic observation. _Developers hardening build pipelines against tampering follow incidents like this on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Harden-Runner Block Mode Now Available for macOS and Windows GitHub-Hosted Runners](https://daily.dev/posts/harden-runner-block-mode-now-available-for-macos-and-windows-github-hosted-runners-ovmu1ywab) · StepSecurity · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [GitHub package firewall in public preview](https://daily.dev/posts/github-package-firewall-in-public-preview-xiaunivjh) · GitHub Changelog · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Runtime Security for Third-Party GitHub Actions Runners: Bitrise, Blacksmith, Depot, Namespace, and Warp](https://daily.dev/posts/runtime-security-for-third-party-github-actions-runners-bitrise-blacksmith-depot-namespace-and--x6jatli6z) · StepSecurity · 10 upvotes · 0 comments - [Runtime Security for AWS CodeBuild-Hosted GitHub Actions Runners](https://daily.dev/posts/runtime-security-for-aws-codebuild-hosted-github-actions-runners-xyn1dbk2c) · StepSecurity · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Introducing deny list egress policies for Harden-Runner](https://daily.dev/posts/introducing-deny-list-egress-policies-for-harden-runner-xvzbaknun) · StepSecurity · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#security](https://daily.dev/tags/security), [#cicd](https://daily.dev/tags/cicd), [#github-actions](https://daily.dev/tags/github-actions) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/github-actions-native-egress-firewall-vs-harden-runner-five-differences-that-matter-zti0whcu6) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"GitHub Actions Native Egress Firewall vs. Harden-Runner: Five Differences That Matter","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/github-actions-native-egress-firewall-vs-harden-runner-five-differences-that-matter-zti0whcu6","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/github-actions-native-egress-firewall-vs-harden-runner-five-differences-that-matter-zti0whcu6"},"datePublished":"2026-10-28T13:28:00.549Z","dateModified":"2026-10-28T14:58:56.216Z","description":"GitHub is rolling out a native egress firewall for GitHub-hosted Actions runners, and StepSecurity compares it with its own Harden-Runner agent. 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