diff --git a/.github/workflows/release.yml b/.github/workflows/release.yml
index e10dc47..c1a5c1f 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/release.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/release.yml
@@ -17,10 +17,36 @@ on:
         required: true
         type: string
 
+# Least privilege, granted per job rather than to the whole file.
+#
+# This block used to read `contents: write` + `id-token: write` +
+# `attestations: write`, and only two of the four jobs narrowed it. Under GitHub
+# Actions' inheritance rules a job with no `permissions:` block of its own receives
+# the whole workflow-level grant, so `quality-gate` and `build` were both handed
+# `id-token: write` — the ability to mint an OIDC token — despite neither needing one.
+# Only `publish-pypi` does, for PyPI trusted publishing, and it already scopes itself.
+#
+# Why that matters more here than in an ordinary repository: an OIDC token minted
+# anywhere in this workflow may be accepted by PyPI as proof of identity for
+# data-product-forge-sdk. So any step in `quality-gate` or `build` — including a
+# third-party action reached through a floating tag — could request one and publish,
+# without ever entering the job that is supposed to be the only publisher. The
+# `environment: pypi` claim on `publish-pypi` blocks this ONLY IF the trusted-publisher
+# configuration on PyPI also pins that environment name; if that field is blank there,
+# nothing distinguishes a token minted in `build` from the real one. That setting lives
+# on pypi.org and cannot be read from here, so this workflow does not depend on it.
+#
+# Precedent, not hypothesis: the compromise of aquasecurity/trivy-action in March 2026
+# rewrote 75 of its 76 tags, and reached a backdoored LiteLLM release through that
+# action sitting inside LiteLLM's own CI.
+#
+# `attestations: write` is dropped outright. It appeared exactly once in this file —
+# in the grant itself. Nothing has ever used it.
+#
+# The default is now read-only, so a job added later without its own block gets the
+# safe end of the mistake rather than the dangerous one.
 permissions:
-  contents: write
-  id-token: write
-  attestations: write
+  contents: read
 
 env:
   PYTHON_VERSION: "3.12"
@@ -33,6 +59,11 @@ jobs:
   quality-gate:
     name: Quality Gate
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    # Lints, tests and reads the version out of pyproject.toml. Checkout is the only
+    # thing here that touches the token. Explicit rather than inherited: the whole
+    # defect being fixed was a job silently receiving more than it asked for.
+    permissions:
+      contents: read
     outputs:
       version: ${{ steps.meta.outputs.version }}
       is_prerelease: ${{ steps.meta.outputs.is_prerelease }}
@@ -85,6 +116,13 @@ jobs:
     name: Build Package
     needs: quality-gate
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    # Builds the sdist and wheel and uploads them as a run artifact. Artifact upload
+    # uses the Actions runtime token, not GITHUB_TOKEN, so it needs no grant here —
+    # proven in this repository rather than assumed: `publish-pypi` below declares only
+    # `id-token: write`, which leaves it `contents: none`, and its
+    # actions/download-artifact step has succeeded in all three successful releases.
+    permissions:
+      contents: read
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v7
 
@@ -138,6 +176,11 @@ jobs:
     name: GitHub Release
     needs: [quality-gate, build]
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    # The one job that legitimately writes: softprops/action-gh-release creates the
+    # release and uploads the dist files to it. It gets `contents: write` and nothing
+    # else — in particular, no `id-token: write`, which it was inheriting before.
+    permissions:
+      contents: write
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v7
         with: