Paul Krill
Editor at Large

Deno Sandbox launched for running AI-generated code

news
Feb 5, 20262 mins

Deno Sandbox works in tandem with Deno Deploy—now in GA—to secure workloads where code must be generated, evaluated, or safely executed on behalf of an untrusted user.

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Deno Land, maker of the Deno runtime, has introduced Deno Sandbox, a secure environment built for code generated by AI agents. The company also announced the long-awaited general availability of Deno Deploy, a serverless platform for running JavaScript and TypeScript applications. Both were announced on February 3.

Now in beta, Deno Sandbox offers lightweight Linux microVMs running as protected environments in the Deno Deploy cloud. Deno Sandbox defends against prompt injection attacks, the company said, where a user or AI attempts to run malicious code. Secrets such as API keys never enter the sandbox and will only appear when an outbound HTTP request is sent to a pre-approved host, according to the company.

Deno Sandbox was created in response to the rise in AI-driven development, explained Deno co-creator Ryan Dahl, as more LLM-generated code is being released with the ability to call external APIs using real credentials, without human review. In this scenario, he wrote, “Sandboxing the compute isn’t enough. You need to control network egress and protect secrets from exfiltration.” Deno Sandbox provides both, according to Dahl. It specializes in workloads where code must be generated, evaluated, or safely executed on behalf of an untrusted user.

Developers can create a Deno Sandbox programmatically via Deno’s JavaScript or Python SDKs. The announcement included the following workload examples for Deno Sandbox:

  • AI agents and copilots that need to run code as they reason
  • Secure plugin or extension systems
  • Vibe-coding and collaborative IDE experiences
  • Ephemeral CI runners and smoke tests
  • Customer-supplied or user-generated code paths
  • Instant dev servers and preview environments

Also announced on February 3 was the general availability of Deno Deploy, a platform for running JavaScript and TypeScript applications in the cloud or on a user’s own infrastructure. It provides a management plane for deploying and running applications with the built-in CLI or through integrations such as GitHub Actions, Deno said. The platform is a rework of Deploy Classic and has a new dashboard, and a new execution environment that uses Deno 2.0.

Paul Krill

Paul Krill is editor at large at InfoWorld. Paul has been covering computer technology as a news and feature reporter for more than 35 years, including 30 years at InfoWorld. He has specialized in coverage of software development tools and technologies since the 1990s, and he continues to lead InfoWorld’s news coverage of software development platforms including Java and .NET and programming languages including JavaScript, TypeScript, PHP, Python, Ruby, Rust, and Go. Long trusted as a reporter who prioritizes accuracy, integrity, and the best interests of readers, Paul is sought out by technology companies and industry organizations who want to reach InfoWorld’s audience of software developers and other information technology professionals. Paul has won a “Best Technology News Coverage” award from IDG.

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