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+# Security Policy
+
+The SciCat project takes security seriously. This file documents the general security
+procedures for SciCatProject repositories. Individual repositories may have additional
+information in their own `SECURITY.md` files.
+
+SciCat is a community-driven, volunteer-maintained open source project. There is no commercial entity operating SciCat, no dedicated security team, and no service-level agreement (SLA) attached to this policy. Response times described below are best-effort targets, not guarantees.
+
+This document describes how the SciCat developers and steering committee handle the discovery, triage, and disclosure of security issues in the upstream project — it does not cover the operational security of any individual deployment.
+
+## Reporting a Vulnerability
+
+If you believe you have found a security vulnerability in SciCat, please report it
+privately via one of the following:
+
+- ✅ Create a **private security advisory** using the 'Report a vulnerability' button in
+  the 'Security and quality' tab or by going to
+  `https://github.com/SciCatProject/<repo>/security/advisories/new`.
+- ✅ Email the project leaders:
+  [scicat-leaders@lists.psi.ch](mailto:scicat-leaders@lists.psi.ch)
+- ✅ Notify a project leader by *Direct Message* in the [scicat slack
+  chat](https://join.slack.com/t/scicat/shared_invite/zt-251efp7t2-8IqFDo3sPN8TYWgKNywccg).
+  Check the [website](https://www.scicatproject.org/) for current project leaders.
+- ❌ DO NOT report security vulnerabilities through public GitHub issues, discussions, or
+  pull requests, public slack channels, etc.
+
+Please include as much information as you can to help us better understand and resolve
+the issue. We will work on fixing the issues
+[privately](https://docs.github.com/en/code-security/security-advisories/working-with-repository-security-advisories/collaborating-in-a-temporary-private-fork-to-resolve-a-repository-security-vulnerability).
+
+
+## Severity Classification
+
+We classify reported issues into three severity levels. Classification is judgment-based and considers exploitability, impact (data exposure, integrity, availability), and whether exploitation requires privileged access.
+
+### Low Severity
+Issues with minimal practical impact — for example, issues requiring unusual local access, exposing non-sensitive information, or requiring significant, unlikely preconditions to exploit.
+
+### Medium Severity
+Issues that could lead to limited unauthorized access, data exposure, or disruption under realistic conditions, but that are constrained in scope (e.g., affecting a single component, requiring authentication, or needing specific configurations to be exploitable).
+
+### High Severity
+Issues that could lead to significant unauthorized access, data loss/exposure, remote code execution, authentication/authorization bypass, or broad service disruption, and that are exploitable under common or default configurations.
+
+Severity is assessed by the maintainers/steering committee and may be revised as more information becomes available.
+
+## Disclosure
+
+Medium and High vulnerabilities are announced confidentially to cybersecurity personal and
+select SciCat operators ahead of the public disclosure to allow organizations time to
+patch public systems. Please [contact the project
+leaders](mailto:scicat-leaders@lists.psi.ch) if you would like to be notified about
+security advisories prior to the public disclosure.
+
+We use GitHub [security
+advisories](https://github.com/SciCatProject/scicat-backend-next/security/advisories) to
+disclose vulnerabilities publicly after a fix is available.
+
+
+## Responding to a vulnerability
+
+This section is intended for SciCat developers responding to a new security advisory.
+
+1. Project Leaders (PL) will triage the severity of the vulnerability and assign developers to start
+   working on a fix.
+   1. Create a private security advisory, if the reporter did not already.
+   2. Grant the team `@SciCatProject/security` access to the advisory
+   3. Declare a code freeze to reduce conflicts until the vulnerability is patched
+2. PL notify the security team privately about the vulnerability. Include information
+   about the expected time to a fix. Facilities should be prepared to update promptly
+   when the patch is released. Private communication channels include:
+    - [scicat-security@lists.psi.ch](https://psilists.ethz.ch/sympa/subscribe/scicat-security)
+      (including Steering Committee members)
+    - `#security` slack channel
+    - [Security](https://github.com/orgs/SciCatProject/teams/security) Github Team
+3. From the advisory, create a private fork to collaborate.
+    1. Develop on the `master` and `release` branches directly. Pull requests from the
+       private fork must match branch names from the upstream repository.
+    2. Keep the fix minimal and don't incorporate additional features. Squash commits
+       regularly to make it easy to cherry-pick.
+    3. Cherry-pick the fix to `master`, `release` (and long-term releases, if
+       applicable)
+    4. Create PRs to back to the upstream repo for review.
+4. Operators have 1-2 days to review the fix & prepare (privately) for the upgrade. If
+   they run a fork, they should cherry-pick the fix onto their deployed branch.
+5. Draft an email announcement and release notes in preparation for the patch release
+6. When the fix is ready:
+    1. Merge all PRs. This is an atomic step.
+    2. Immediately make a patch release from the `release` branch
+    3. Send the email announcement with information
+7. Facilities update to the new release or master branch.
+8. The next scicat operator meeting should include a retrospective analyzing the
+   incident response.
+
+
+The private fork after development should look something like this:
+
+```mermaid
+gitGraph
+   commit id: "5.2.0-feature"
+   branch release
+   commit id: "5.2.0" tag: "v5.2.0"
+   checkout main
+   commit id: "5.3.0-feature"
+   commit id: "advisory-fix-1"
+
+   checkout release
+   cherry-pick id: "advisory-fix-1" tag:"v5.2.1"
+```
+
+Alternately, it may be easier to develop the fix on `release` and then merge it back
+into `main`. Both should produce the same result.
+
+### Target Response Times (Best Effort)
+
+| Severity | Initial Acknowledgment | Steering Committee Notification | Target Fix & Public Release |
+|----------|------------------------|----------------------------------|------------------------------|
+| High     | 1–3 business days      | As soon as confirmed             | As soon as practical; expedited effort from available maintainers |
+| Medium   | Up to 5 business days  | Within the same window as confirmation | Next reasonable release cycle, or sooner if maintainer capacity allows |
+| Low      | Up to 5 business days  | Included in routine steering committee updates | Bundled into a regular release |
+
+These timeframes reflect a volunteer effort and depend on maintainer availability. There is no contractual or business-criticality obligation behind them.
+
+## Supported Versions
+
+| Version | Supported ||---------|-----------|
+| latest  | ✅ |
+| LTS | ✅ |
+| v3.x | not supported |
+
+## Scope
+This policy covers the SciCat core codebase and components maintained under the SciCat GitHub organization. It does not cover:
+- Vulnerabilities in third-party dependencies (please report these upstream, though letting us know is appreciated so we can track and update)
+- The security configuration or operation of any specific institutional deployment of SciCat
+
+## Questions
+For anything not covered here, reach out via the SciCat Slack Channel.
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