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SAFE Viewer

The SAFE Viewer is a standalone application developed by ReversingLabs for working with the SAFE report in the RL-SAFE archive format. The RL-SAFE archive contains the full SAFE report and all other supported report formats for a software package analyzed with Spectra Assure.

When you open the archive in the SAFE Viewer, it looks and behaves the same as a standalone report generated with the rl-secure report rl-html command, or the report you open directly on the Portal and share with others via Portal UI.

The SAFE Viewer is available for download to anyone and can be used without a Spectra Assure license or an Internet connection.

The Viewer is most suitable for the following use-cases:

  • Working with large reports that cannot be opened due to limited system resources or file size restrictions in place.
  • Auditing and storing reports as snapshots of software analysis at a specific point in time. Users can export the RL-SAFE archive for analyzed software versions, and preserve the results even if the versions are later removed from their Portal or CLI projects or reprocessed. Having these reports on hand at all times enables organizations to implement the audit process in ways they see fit.

With SAFE Viewer you can:

  • open the SAFE report generated in a portable archive format (.rl-safe) with rl-secure, with the Portal API, or exported from the Portal UI
  • open the SAFE report in a portable archive format (.rl-safe) shared with you
  • export certain parts of the report in their designated formats
Archives from unknown or unreliable sources

Even though the SAFE Viewer processes are sandboxed to minimize damage from potentially malicious code, do not open any RL-SAFE archives from unknown or unreliable sources.

Get SAFE Viewer​

The SAFE Viewer is a self-contained Electron application that supports the following operating systems:

For Windows, the Viewer is distributed only as an installation package, while for Linux, it's available both as an installation package and a ready-to-run portable executable.

Current version (27/02/2025)

Current version of the SAFE Viewer is 1.0.4.

Linux​

For Linux, you can download the latest version of the SAFE Viewer in any of the formats listed in the following table. SHA-256 checksums for installer packages are included in the table for integrity verification purposes.

FormatDownload linksSHA-256 checksum
AppImage (x64)Downloada1fb58b1d75a7d90f944e0bc77108e3c9d1c72fa7209f7987a7e3df636d18fb6
AppImage (arm64) ExperimentalDownload363e43324fe87c51af8a8fd5798b4794d0ccf0ae1c352590f4a3ebec098fe3ff
DEB (x64)Download058561344bb8c723512160b7fb0f01dbcfc736452d57a925fdebe4070cc5710b
DEB (arm64) ExperimentalDownload6feeeeee54f9c5e20de5803eafca520b1e9e6cc64e06b6fad87f1e190b3da5d0
RPM (x64)Download166cdc374311d399dcbf3ef382acef1f13d64f8c74626c227350148d44beca2d
RPM (arm64) ExperimentalDownload5035b93b511c2ff4572b9573e30988ce841acda75af9315c11ed9889bc613f0e
SNAP (x64)Downloada359039e7e6e9568d4404611d135c57028038e419dc6fd0f755e3271a2aa497b
info

Ubuntu 24 LTS is not supported. Due to some major changes that came with that version, some Electron applications do not work.

Windows​

For Windows, you can download the latest version of the SAFE Viewer in any of the formats listed in the following table. SHA-256 checksums for installer packages are included in the table for integrity verification purposes.

FormatDownload linksSHA-256 checksum
Windows Installer (x64)Download73933c2b973ea4cc4edd55a825fa9767af75bc46d0bf283dd7096384d3f8325a
Windows Installer (arm64) ExperimentalDownloadee71e42dc057674a8575f159e3a08fd3adc757a78067351623e4d1d6a1c23f19

Who should use the SAFE Viewer?​

The SAFE Viewer is an ideal choice for users who:

  • do not have a Portal account or CLI license, but an RL-SAFE archive was shared with them and they want to view it
  • have a Portal account, but want to export the SAFE report from the Portal and view it offline
  • want to open RL-SAFE archives generated with the CLI or with the Portal API

Prerequisites​

Complete the following tasks before installing the SAFE Viewer:

  • Make sure you have the supported OS version. Check the Known issues section for more details.
  • Download the installation package or a portable executable from any of the sources above and save it somewhere on your system where you can easily access it.

Install SAFE Viewer​

In this step, you're going to install the SAFE Viewer.

Linux installation​

If you downloaded an AppImage, you first need to mark it as an executable. This is done in any of the following ways:

From the UI

  1. Locate the file.
  2. Right-click on the icon and select Properties > Executable as Program.
  3. After that, double-click on the icon to launch it.

From the Terminal

  1. Locate the file and run the following from the Terminal:
chmod a+x rl-safe-viewer-linux-x86_64.AppImage
  1. Next, launch the application: 
rl-safe-viewer

Windows installation​

  1. Locate the .exe file.
  2. Double-click on it and follow the installation instructions in the wizard that opens.

When to update the SAFE Viewer?​

The SAFE Viewer is backwards-compatible. This means that if you have the latest version of the Viewer, you can open RL-SAFE archives generated with older versions of Spectra Assure products.

However, this does not work the other way around. If you have an old version of the Viewer, but the archive you want to open was generated with the latest version of the CLI or Portal, an error will occur due to compatibility issues.

To make sure you can open all RL-SAFE archives, it is essential to always use the latest version of the SAFE Viewer.

The SAFE Viewer does not auto-update. Every time a new version is available, you need to download it to your machine. You can find your current version information in the lower left corner of the Viewer launch screen. To check if a new version is available, use the Help menu in the Viewer navbar.

Work with the SAFE report​

This guide includes the ReversingLabs transparency report.

To get started with the SAFE Viewer, you can download the example reports by clicking any of the following cards:

Report 1
Example report for Solr 8.10.0.
Report 2
Example report for UAParser.js 0.7.29.
Report 3
Example report for reproducible build artifact.

Open the SAFE report​

To open the SAFE report, first open the Viewer and drag and drop the RL-SAFE archive file into the designated spot.

If this is not your preferred method, use any of the following buttons:

  • Choose a File, in the middle of the drag-and-drop area
  • File > Open Report, from the menu located in the application navbar

Alternatively, you can double-click on the RL-SAFE archive file saved on your machine. This automatically opens both the Viewer and the report. If this does not work, manually set the file format association for the .rl-safe format on your system.

No matter how you open the report, the Viewer performs integrity verification before displaying the report contents. Usually, the verification process is done instantly, but may take a while for large reports.

The report opens automatically if the integrity verification passes. If it fails, an error message pops up and you cannot view the report contents. In case this happens, check whether you have the latest version of the SAFE Viewer.

When you open a report, it's added to the list of recently viewed reports and can be quickly accessed from there the next time you run the Viewer. You can have multiple reports open at the same time, but each one is displayed in its own application window.

Open a password-protected report​

The SAFE Viewer can open password-protected RL-SAFE archives.

To view a password-protected report, open its RL-SAFE archive and provide a password when prompted to decrypt the report contents. You can view the report only if you provide the correct password.

When sharing password-protected RL-SAFE archives with others, make sure to send them the correct password.

Export a part of the report​

If you want to save a certain part of the report in the desired format to your machine, you can do so either with the Export option in the navbar or directly from any report page available for export.

Only the following parts of the report can be exported from the SAFE Viewer:

  • SBOM, in either the CycloneDX or SPDX format
  • Issues, in the SARIF format
  • Vulnerabilities, in the RL-CVE format
  • Networking, in the RL-URI format

Differences in the SAFE reports between products​

Although the SAFE report looks and behaves consistently across all Spectra Assure products, some slight differences do exist:

1. Amount of diff versions per file

On the Portal Projects page, only a single diff can be created for each package version. This is due to the fact that for each package version you upload to the Projects page, you can choose only one predecessor (i.e., the older version it derived from).

On the other hand, the CLI allows you to create multiple diffs for each package version. In this case, multiple diff checks are listed in the Performed checks section of the report Summary page.

If your RL-SAFE archive was generated with the CLI and contains multiple diff reports, the SAFE Viewer allows you to switch between them from the Select Diff menu in the navbar.

2. Inclusion of the binary

In Portal Projects, it's possible to download the software package (binary file) directly from the report page. If this option is enabled when generating a share link for the report, every user that receives the report link can also download the binary.

On the other hand, the RL-SAFE archive does not include the binary of the analyzed package version - only its report. The binary of the package version cannot be exported from the SAFE Viewer app, no matter which Spectra Assure product the archive is generated with.

Known issues​

To offer you the best possible experience with the SAFE Viewer, this section contains a list of issues with the application we're aware of. If you run into an issue while using the Viewer, first check the following list:

  • Drag and drop works randomly for SAFE Report Viewer on Debian 12 ("Bookworm") version.