diff --git a/README.rst b/README.rst
index c23027d..cd7be1f 100644
--- a/README.rst
+++ b/README.rst
@@ -284,6 +284,17 @@ The tool automatically extracts file extensions from HTTP headers to ensure file
 **Fine-grained token limitation:** Due to a GitHub platform limitation, fine-grained personal access tokens (``github_pat_...``) cannot download attachments from private repositories directly. This affects both ``/assets/`` (images) and ``/files/`` (documents) URLs. The tool implements a workaround for image attachments using GitHub's Markdown API, which converts URLs to temporary JWT-signed URLs that can be downloaded. However, this workaround only works for images - document attachments (PDFs, text files, etc.) will fail with 404 errors when using fine-grained tokens on private repos. For full attachment support on private repositories, use a classic token (``-t``) instead of a fine-grained token (``-f``). See `#477 <https://github.com/josegonzalez/python-github-backup/issues/477>`_ for details.
 
 
+About security advisories
+-------------------------
+
+GitHub security advisories are only available in public repositories. GitHub does not provide the respective API endpoint for private repositories.
+
+Therefore the logic is implemented as follows:
+- Security advisories are included in the `--all` option.
+- If only the `--all` option was provided, backups of security advisories are skipped for private repositories.
+- If the `--security-advisories` option is provided (on its own or in addition to `--all`), a backup of security advisories is attempted for all repositories, with graceful handling if the GitHub API doesn't return any.
+
+
 Run in Docker container
 -----------------------
 
diff --git a/github_backup/github_backup.py b/github_backup/github_backup.py
index 705f013..346d541 100644
--- a/github_backup/github_backup.py
+++ b/github_backup/github_backup.py
@@ -1814,7 +1814,7 @@ def backup_repositories(args, output_directory, repositories):
             if args.include_milestones or args.include_everything:
                 backup_milestones(args, repo_cwd, repository, repos_template)
 
-            if args.include_security_advisories or args.include_everything:
+            if args.include_security_advisories or (args.include_everything and not repository["Private"]):
                 backup_security_advisories(args, repo_cwd, repository, repos_template)
 
             if args.include_labels or args.include_everything:
@@ -2039,13 +2039,20 @@ def backup_security_advisories(args, repo_cwd, repository, repos_template):
         return
 
     logger.info("Retrieving {0} security advisories".format(repository["full_name"]))
-    mkdir_p(repo_cwd, advisory_cwd)
 
     template = "{0}/{1}/security-advisories".format(
         repos_template, repository["full_name"]
     )
 
-    _advisories = retrieve_data(args, template)
+    try:
+        _advisories = retrieve_data(args, template)
+    except Exception as e:
+        if "404" in str(e):
+            logger.info("Security advisories are not available for this repository, skipping")
+            return
+        raise
+
+    mkdir_p(repo_cwd, advisory_cwd)
 
     advisories = {}
     for advisory in _advisories: