Stay organized with collections
Save and categorize content based on your preferences.
Scan OS packages manually
This quickstart shows you how to pull a container image, manually scan it for operating system vulnerabilities with
the On-Demand Scanning API, and retrieve identified vulnerabilities. To follow this
quickstart you will use Cloud Shell and an example Ubuntu image.
Before you begin
Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to
Google Cloud,
create an account to evaluate how our products perform in
real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to
run, test, and deploy workloads.
In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page,
select or create a Google Cloud project.
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Hard to understand","hardToUnderstand","thumb-down"],["Incorrect information or sample code","incorrectInformationOrSampleCode","thumb-down"],["Missing the information/samples I need","missingTheInformationSamplesINeed","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-25 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eThis guide demonstrates how to manually scan a container image for operating system vulnerabilities using the On-Demand Scanning API.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe process involves using Cloud Shell to pull a container image, exemplified by the latest Ubuntu image, using \u003ccode\u003edocker pull\u003c/code\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe \u003ccode\u003egcloud artifacts docker images scan\u003c/code\u003e command initiates the vulnerability scan of the pulled image, and returns a scan name for further actions.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eScan results are retrieved using the \u003ccode\u003egcloud artifacts docker images list-vulnerabilities\u003c/code\u003e command and the scan name from the previous scan.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThis resource also provides information on enabling automated scanning and offers additional resources to understand container scanning concepts.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,["# Quickstart: Scan OS packages manually\n\nScan OS packages manually\n=========================\n\nThis quickstart shows you how to pull a container image, manually scan it for operating system vulnerabilities with\nthe On-Demand Scanning API, and retrieve identified vulnerabilities. To follow this\nquickstart you will use Cloud Shell and an example Ubuntu image.\n\nBefore you begin\n----------------\n\n- Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, [create an account](https://console.cloud.google.com/freetrial) to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.\n- In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page,\n select or create a Google Cloud project.\n\n | **Note**: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.\n\n [Go to project selector](https://console.cloud.google.com/projectselector2/home/dashboard)\n-\n [Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project](/billing/docs/how-to/verify-billing-enabled#confirm_billing_is_enabled_on_a_project).\n\n-\n\n\n Enable the On-Demand Scanning API.\n\n\n [Enable the API](https://console.cloud.google.com/flows/enableapi?apiid=ondemandscanning.googleapis.com&redirect=https://cloud.google.com/artifact-analysis/docs/quickstart-scanning-os-manually)\n\n- In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page,\n select or create a Google Cloud project.\n\n | **Note**: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.\n\n [Go to project selector](https://console.cloud.google.com/projectselector2/home/dashboard)\n-\n [Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project](/billing/docs/how-to/verify-billing-enabled#confirm_billing_is_enabled_on_a_project).\n\n-\n\n\n Enable the On-Demand Scanning API.\n\n\n [Enable the API](https://console.cloud.google.com/flows/enableapi?apiid=ondemandscanning.googleapis.com&redirect=https://cloud.google.com/artifact-analysis/docs/quickstart-scanning-os-manually)\n\nDownload and scan an image\n--------------------------\n\n1. Open a Cloud Shell in your project.\n\n [Open Cloud Shell](https://console.cloud.google.com/?cloudshell=true)\n\n This opens a terminal with all the required tools to follow this guide.\n2. Use docker to pull the latest Ubuntu image.\n\n docker pull ubuntu:latest\n\n3. Run the scan.\n\n gcloud artifacts docker images scan ubuntu:latest\n\n This triggers that scanning process and returns the scan name when finished: \n\n ```\n ✓ Scanning container image\n ✓ Locally extracting packages and versions from local container image\n ✓ Remotely initiating analysis of packages and versions\n ✓ Waiting for analysis operation to complete [projects/my-project/locations/us/operations/1a6fd941-b997-4e5f-ba4f-6351f30e7dad]\n Done.\n\n done: true\n metadata:\n '@type': type.googleapis.com/google.cloud.ondemandscanning.v1.AnalyzePackagesMetadata\n createTime: '2021-01-26T13:43:53.112123Z'\n resourceUri: ubuntu:latest\n name: projects/my-project/locations/us/operations/1a6fd941-b99f-4eaf-ba4f-6e5af30e7dad\n response:\n '@type': type.googleapis.com/google.cloud.ondemandscanning.v1.AnalyzePackagesResponse\n scan: projects/my-project/locations/us/scans/893c91ce-7fe6-4f1a-a69a-d6ca1b465160\n ```\n4. Use the scan name, the value of `scan` from the output, to fetch the scan results.\n\n gcloud artifacts docker images list-vulnerabilities \\\n projects/my-project/locations/us/scans/893c91ce-7fe6-4f1a-a69a-d6ca1b465160\n\nClean up\n--------\n\n\nTo avoid incurring charges to your Google Cloud account for\nthe resources used on this page, follow these steps.\nIf you created a new project for this guide, you can now delete the project.\n\nWhat's next\n-----------\n\n- [Explore all the On-Demand Scanning API options](/artifact-analysis/docs/scan-os-on-demand).\n- [Enable automated scanning](/artifact-analysis/docs/scan-os-automatically).\n- [Understand container scanning concepts](/artifact-analysis/docs/container-scanning-overview)."]]
