Stop trusting install-time scripts — sandbox and attest package installs

Modern package ecosystems allow arbitrary install-time scripts to run with developer or CI privileges, creating a persistent and understudied attack surface for developer organizations, platform teams, and security groups. This is material for enterprises — roughly 250,000 developer organizations could justify a $30K annual contract for tools that prevent these attacks — because provenance alone does not prevent malicious or accidental behavior executed during npm, pip, cargo, or system package installs. A practical product would sandbox installs at the package-manager level, execute install-time hooks in a constrained environment, and emit verifiable signed attestations stored in an open transparency log so CI/CD gates or runtime platforms can decide whether to trust a package. Deliverables would include lightweight client integrations (CI plugins and developer CLI), a policy-as-code engine to approve or block behaviors, and an enterprise console for audit and incident response. The window for this is favorable: supply-chain breaches and media attention have shifted budgets toward prevention, organizations are moving security earlier into CI/CD, and standards momentum (Sigstore/Rekor) makes install-time attestations interoperable. Market signals back this up — an addressable market of roughly $7.5B, a market score of 92/100 and revenue potential 88/100 — implying buyers and willingness to pay. To differentiate, prioritize low-latency, cross-ecosystem support and first-class attestation compatibility rather than treating this as another SBOM or signature product; coupling accurate behavioral analysis with auditable attestations creates a defensible enterprise wedge. Be honest about challenges: significant engineering effort to cover many package ecosystems, the risk of developer friction and false positives, and the sales/organizational work required to place an install-time control plane into CI/CD and platform tooling.