Let's be blunt: if you're delivering production software through GitHub and still using GitHub Teams, you're flying blind.

You might feel secure because you've enabled CODEOWNERS and branch protections. Maybe you require reviews and limit who can push to main. But those controls were standard ten years ago. GitHub's threat surface has evolved. And most teams haven't caught up.

If you're using GitHub Actions, managing secrets, or allowing contractors to push code, you are exposed in ways your current governance cannot prevent.

And here's the hard truth: we waited longer than we should have to upgrade. After switching to GitHub Enterprise, we realized just how much we were leaving up to chance.

Let's walk through what you're risking, and why GitHub Enterprise isn't just for FAANG—it's for any team serious about software delivery.

GitHub Is Now Your Software Supply Chain

GitHub is no longer just source control. It's:

• Your CI/CD orchestrator (via Actions)
• Your identity layer (via GitHub logins and OIDC to cloud providers)
• Your environment secrets manager
• Your change management system

That makes it:

• An entry point into production
• A gateway to cloud permissions via GitHub OIDC
• The layer most developers interact with daily

So if GitHub is compromised—or even just misused—your prod environment is at risk.

The Secrets Trap Most Teams Don't See

Here's the trajectory most teams follow:

• You're using CODEOWNERS and branch protections to ensure no one can commit directly to main. Good.
• You're storing secrets as repository secrets instead of hardcoding them into source. Also good.
• You believe your secrets are safe because only trusted engineers have write access. Not quite.

The reality is:

• GitHub Teams doesn't support GitHub Environments with scoped secrets.
• Repository secrets are accessible from any workflow in the repository.
• Anyone with write access to any branch can push code that uses those secrets, trigger a workflow, and delete the branch afterward.

All without creating a pull request. No review. Limited audit trail.

There is no way to scope repository secrets. They behave like shared team secrets, with no protections beyond repository write access.

And that's the point: GitHub Teams assumes a single team with mutual trust. As soon as you move beyond that model, you need GitHub Enterprise.

Once you understand that, the rest falls into place.

Governance Beyond the Basics

Foundational controls like CODEOWNERS and branch protections are a great start—but they aren't enough for modern delivery.

Let's look at what's possible in GitHub Teams:

• Anyone with write access can create tags
• Tags can point to any commit (even unmerged orphaned commits)
• Workflows can be triggered by tags, branches, or manual events
• Repository secrets are global and accessible across branches

So a bad actor or even a careless dev could:

• Create an orphaned commit containing malicious logic
• Tag that commit to look like a legitimate release
• Trigger a workflow that deploys that tag

You now have a supply chain compromise, and no branch protections or PR reviews can catch it.

GitHub Enterprise gives you:

• Environment-level secrets scoped to protected branches
• Immutable tag protections that prevent tampering
• Rulesets enforced at the org level across repos
• Approval workflows that gate deploys, not just merges

And, critically:

• The ability to maintain consistency across all your repositories
• The power to avoid org-wide secrets (which behave like a shared skeleton key)

If you're using org secrets today, we'll say it plainly: those are barely secrets. Every repo that uses them exposes them.

With GitHub Enterprise, you can retire that risk.

Even Small Teams Need Guardrails

Let's say you're a small startup. Why should you care?

Because you:

• Work with external contractors
• Use GitHub Actions for deploys (especially when using Terraform!)
• Have customer data
• Push secrets into environment configs

All it takes is one compromised token, one malicious branch, one mistake with a tag.

And unlike the big guys, you don't have an incident response team to catch it.

GitHub Enterprise gives you:

• Peace of mind that only trusted workflows can deploy
• Restricted secrets that are only accessible from main or release branches
• Real approvals before prod goes live
• Separation of duties (devs can merge but not deploy)

It's the kind of maturity that makes auditors and customers feel good about working with you.

Our Story: We Waited Too Long

At Cloud Posse, we use GitHub heavily:

• We ship Terraform modules, platforms, and reference architectures
• We rely on GitHub Actions for CI/CD
• We support multiple customers, contractors, and internal repos

And for too long, we stayed on GitHub Teams.

We had protections. We had good hygiene. We thought we knew our risks.

But it wasn't until we moved to GitHub Enterprise that we realized:

We had been trusting too much and governing too little.

Now we have real deployment approvals. Protected tags. Environment and branch scoped secrets. Org-wide policy enforcement with rulesets. We sleep better. We move faster.

It's Actually Not That Expensive

If you're hesitating because of the cost or complexity, we get it. But the truth is:

You're already betting your company on GitHub. You should govern it like it matters.

GitHub Enterprise isn't as expensive as most people assume—especially when compared to other tools in your stack.

In fact, you're probably already spending more on: ChatGPT, Cursor, Slack, Salesforce, HubSpot, and Cloud IDEs.

And none of those tools are how your software gets shipped.

GitHub Teams supports environments, but doesn't support environment-scoped secrets or protected tags. The governance features that matter—the ones that secure your production delivery—are in GitHub Enterprise.

GitHub is your delivery platform. It governs what code gets built, tested, reviewed, and deployed.

Why wouldn't you harden that?

Final Thought

GitHub Enterprise isn't just for big tech.

It's for:

• Teams working with contractors
• Startups shipping real products
• Companies moving fast and staying compliant
• Anyone using GitHub to ship production software

If GitHub is how you deliver change, then GitHub Enterprise is how you govern it.

Talk to an engineer. We'll help you figure out what protections you actually need—and what you can stop worrying about once you have them.