diff --git a/.github/scripts/check-syft-version-is-release.sh b/.github/scripts/check-syft-version-is-release.sh
new file mode 100755
index 00000000000..d01a30f1a19
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.github/scripts/check-syft-version-is-release.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env bash
+set -e
+
+version=$(grep -E "github.com/anchore/syft" go.mod | awk '{print $NF}')
+
+# ensure that the version is a release version (not a commit hash)
+# a release in this case means that the go tooling resolved the version to a tag
+# this does not guarantee that the tag has a github release associated with it
+if [[ ! $version =~ ^v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]?$ ]]; then
+    echo "syft version in go.mod is not a release version: $version"
+    echo "please update the version in go.mod to a release version and try again"
+    exit 1
+else
+    echo "syft version in go.mod is a release version: $version"
+fi
diff --git a/.github/scripts/trigger-release.sh b/.github/scripts/trigger-release.sh
index c1a5432efa0..42b75fc58be 100755
--- a/.github/scripts/trigger-release.sh
+++ b/.github/scripts/trigger-release.sh
@@ -9,6 +9,9 @@ if ! [ -x "$(command -v gh)" ]; then
     exit 1
 fi
 
+# we want to stop the release as early as possible if the version is not a release version
+./.github/scripts/check-syft-version-is-release.sh
+
 gh auth status
 
 # we need all of the git state to determine the next version. Since tagging is done by
diff --git a/.github/workflows/release.yaml b/.github/workflows/release.yaml
index d813b499232..5f7e588e29e 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/release.yaml
+++ b/.github/workflows/release.yaml
@@ -15,6 +15,10 @@ jobs:
     runs-on: ubuntu-20.04
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@b4ffde65f46336ab88eb53be808477a3936bae11 #v4.1.1
+
+      - name: Check if pinned syft is a release version
+        run: .github/scripts/check-syft-version-is-release.sh
+
       - name: Check if tag already exists
         # note: this will fail if the tag already exists
         run: |