# Secrets How TaskStation stores project credentials, and how it controls whether agent code can read each value. Canonical page: https://taskstation.co/docs/project/secrets A secret is a per-project credential — an API key, token, or connection string — that a session needs but that must not live in the repository. TaskStation stores secrets on the project, never on the account, and encrypts every value with AES-256-GCM using a key derived per project. ## Identifier and name Each secret has two names. The `identifier` is the handle you use in the CLI and in an agent's `secrets` grant. The `name` is the uppercase environment-variable key in the sandbox, for example `STRIPE_API_KEY`. In most projects the identifier and the name match. They differ only when a project holds several candidate values for one name — for example, a primary and a backup Google Maps key can both resolve to `GOOGLE_MAPS_API_KEY`. Every access rule uses the identifier. None of them uses the name. ## Exposure and usage A secret carries two independent settings. Read them separately; they answer different questions. | Setting | Question it answers | Values | |---|---|---| | **Exposure** | Can agent code read the real value? | `environment`, `egress-enforced`, `none` | | **Usage** | Who spends it? | Agent code, LLM gateway, Connector, Git | Older TaskStation documentation presented one list that mixed the two. It is gone. There is no choice between a "network boundary" and an "HTTPS broker": one mechanism serves every egress-enforced secret on every sandbox provider. ### The three exposures | Exposure | What the sandbox holds | Use it for | |---|---|---| | **Environment** | The real value, as a plain environment variable | The default. Values the agent must compute with, and protocols that are not HTTPS | | **Egress-enforced** | A **handle** — a self-describing placeholder, worth nothing on its own | Experimental. HTTPS calls, once the `secrets_egress` flag is on | | **None** | Nothing at all | A credential only a TaskStation service spends, or a value kept on file and disabled | > **The working rule** > **Environment** is the default exposure. The real value loads into the sandbox, > where the agent can read, print, and forward it. **Egress-enforced** keeps the > value outside the sandbox, but it is experimental: enable the `secrets_egress` > feature flag (Settings → Feature flags) to use it. Until then, a secret loads > into the sandbox environment. ### Usages Most usages are assigned by TaskStation, not by you: - **Agent code** — implied whenever exposure is not `none`. - **LLM gateway** — assigned when the value is a recognized model-provider key. The gateway authenticates provider requests server-side. - **Connector:<slug>** — assigned by the connector binding flow. - **Git** — assigned by TaskStation for its own Git access. Read-only; you cannot set or clear it. A secret with exposure `none` and no usage renders as **Disabled**: stored, encrypted, and spent by nothing. ## Sent secrets and computed secrets Which exposure a secret can use is a property of the **upstream**, not of TaskStation. - **Sent secrets** — the value travels on the wire. API keys, bearer tokens, passwords. This is the vast majority. There is a moment where the value is bytes in an outbound request, so TaskStation can put it there itself, outside the sandbox. A sent secret can move to **egress-enforced** once the `secrets_egress` flag is on; by default it loads into the sandbox environment. - **Computed secrets** — the value is an ingredient in a calculation and never travels. AWS SigV4 signing keys, HMAC webhook-signing secrets, JWT client assertions, SSH private keys. Whoever computes must hold the value. No network boundary helps, because nothing on the wire contains the credential. Computed secrets must stay on **environment**. Environment is the default exposure, and the only one that can serve a credential the sandbox has to do math with. Non-HTTPS protocols — a Postgres connection string, SMTP credentials — are in the same position: they must stay on environment. When you save a value that looks like signing material, such as an `AKIA…` access-key pair or PEM/SSH material, TaskStation defaults it to **environment** and says why: this key signs requests locally, so egress enforcement cannot apply. ## Egress-enforced exposure > **Experimental — needs the secrets_egress flag** > Enforcement at the network is experimental. Enable the `secrets_egress` feature > flag (Settings → Feature flags) to use it. Until then, a secret loads into the > sandbox environment. With the flag off, creating an egress-enforced secret > returns `403` `feature_disabled`. The sandbox receives an environment variable whose value is a **handle**, not the credential. The agent uses that variable exactly as it would use the real key — in a header, a query string, or a body. `Authorization: Bearer $VAR`, `Cookie: …=$VAR`, an `X-Api-Key` header, a query parameter, and a JSON or form body field all work: TaskStation finds the handle wherever it appears (raw, URL-encoded, standalone base64, or JSON-escaped) and swaps in the real value. On the way out, TaskStation replaces the handle with the real value, but only for requests to hosts you approved. > **Send the handle as-is — do not base64 it yourself** > One thing does not work: hiding the handle inside a base64 blob you build > yourself, which is what **HTTP Basic auth** does (`curl -u $VAR:` → > `Authorization: Basic `). TaskStation cannot find a handle that is embedded, > unaligned, inside base64 you encoded, so the swap never happens and the upstream > answers `401`. Put the handle in a Bearer/token header, a query parameter, or a > body field instead. If the API only supports Basic auth, use **environment** > exposure for that secret. ```text agent's ordinary HTTP client └─▶ in-guest shim (terminates TLS for approved hosts only; holds no secret) └─▶ TaskStation, server-side host allow-list → resolve grant and session allowlist → decrypt → substitute handle → call upstream → redact echoes → audit ``` Facts that follow from that shape: - The real value is **never** in the sandbox: not an environment variable, not a file, not an alias. - A handle sent to a host you did not approve arrives as the literal handle string. The upstream rejects it. It is worth nothing. - A handle with a bad signature is never honored, and TaskStation records it as a forged handle. A valid handle for a secret this session may not spend is recorded as a stolen one. - The mechanism is identical on every sandbox provider — Daytona, E2B, and Platinum. There is no flag to turn on and no provider to pin. - Every relayed request writes a per-request audit record. - Hosts that are not on the list are tunnelled without being read. Pinned-TLS and mTLS clients to those hosts are unaffected. ### Hosts match exactly List every host you call, one exact hostname per line. | Rejected | Reason | |---|---| | A wildcard host, `*.example.com` | The agent must never choose the destination | | A URL scheme other than HTTPS | TaskStation terminates TLS to substitute | `api.example.com` does not cover `uploads.api.example.com`. Add the second host to the same secret. TaskStation rejects an unenforceable policy with `400` when you save it — it never stores a rule it cannot apply. Two egress-enforced secrets may share one host. Each handle maps to its own value, so both substitute correctly in the same request. ### Verify it with two probes Run both probes from inside the sandbox, against a host that is on the list. The example uses `postman-echo.com`, which serves one endpoint of each kind. Add it as an allowed host for the duration of the test. ```bash # 1. Reachability — an endpoint that does NOT echo request headers. curl -s -o /dev/null -w '%{http_code}\n' https://postman-echo.com/status/200 # expected: 200 # 2. Substitution — an endpoint that DOES echo request headers. curl -sS -H "authorization: Bearer $STRIPE_API_KEY" https://postman-echo.com/get # expected: 200, with "Bearer [REDACTED]" in the echoed headers ``` Read the pair together, probe 1 first: it is the only one that tells you the host is reachable, and probe 2 proves nothing until it passes. | Probe 2 result | Meaning | |---|---| | `200`, echoed header shows `[REDACTED]` | Working. The real value went upstream and the echo was redacted on the way back. | | `200`, echoed header shows the handle itself | The substitution did not run. Check the host list and the agent grant. | | `401` from a real API host | The substitution did not run. Same two checks. | | An empty reply or a connection error | A real failure. This is not a success symptom. | Confirm the real value is nowhere in the guest: ```bash env | grep '^STRIPE_API_KEY=' # expected: the handle, not the credential ``` The identifier also appears inside `TASKSTATION_SECRET_CAPABILITIES`, the value-free catalog that tells the agent which secrets exist, which variable holds each handle, and which hosts each one covers. It never carries a value. A host on the list presents a certificate TaskStation issued for this sandbox, which the sandbox already trusts, rather than the origin's own: ```bash curl -sv https://postman-echo.com/status/200 2>&1 | grep 'issuer:' # issuer: CN=TaskStation Egress CA (); O=TaskStation ``` ### What the relay changes An approved host is reached through TaskStation, so it behaves a little differently from a direct call: - Responses are not streamed. Server-sent events and websockets do not work through an approved host. - A request body is capped at 1 MiB, a response at 5 MiB, and the whole call at 30 seconds. TaskStation follows at most 3 redirects. - Only a fixed set of response headers comes back — content type and language, caching validators, the rate-limit family, `retry-after`, `x-request-id`. - Only clients that honour `https_proxy` are intercepted. TaskStation sets that variable, and the matching CA trust, in the agent's environment. A process started with a scrubbed environment calls the host directly, and its request leaves carrying the handle. For a request TaskStation cannot intercept, the agent has an explicit door to the same hosts under the same policy: ```bash taskstation secrets call STRIPE_API_KEY https://api.stripe.com/v1/customers ``` ## Environment exposure The sandbox receives the real value as a plain environment variable. Agent code can read it, print it, and forward it anywhere. TaskStation cannot redact it, cannot audit its use, and cannot stop it leaving. Environment is the default exposure. Every new secret uses it unless you move the secret to egress-enforced, which is experimental and needs the `secrets_egress` flag. A computed credential, and any non-HTTPS protocol, must stay on environment. ## Shared and personal scope A secret is either shared or a personal override: - **Shared** — the project-wide value. Every principal with the `project.secret.read` permission sees every shared secret. Who may read a secret is the permission; which agent receives it is the manifest grant below. - **Personal override** — your own value for one name, used instead of the shared row for sessions you start. Today TaskStation uses this only for one OAuth login credential. TaskStation never lets an LLM provider key, for example `ANTHROPIC_API_KEY`, become a personal override. The model gateway always reads the shared row. ## Add a secret ### Set the value from the CLI ```bash taskstation secrets set STRIPE_API_KEY=sk_live_... ``` TaskStation saves it as a shared secret for the project. To store more than one value under the same name, add `--identifier `. Names can't start with `TASKSTATION_` — TaskStation reserves that prefix for platform values. ### Or use the dashboard Open the project's Secrets page, enter the key and value, and save. TaskStation encrypts the value immediately and defaults every new secret to **environment** exposure — the real value loads into the sandbox. To move a secret to egress-enforced exposure, first enable the `secrets_egress` feature flag (Settings → Feature flags); it is experimental. With the flag on, the Secrets page shows the **"Can your code read this value?"** control: answering *no* moves the secret to egress enforcement and shows the host list; answering *yes* keeps environment exposure. With the flag off, a secret stays on environment. ### Grant it to an agent Pick an agent on the Secrets page, or add the identifier to that agent's `secrets` list in `taskstation.yaml` yourself. A session only receives the secrets its agent is granted. See [Grant a secret to an agent](#grant-a-secret-to-an-agent). ## Grant a secret to an agent A session receives a secret only when the agent it runs names the identifier in its `secrets` list. Matching uses the identifier, not the name, and ignores case. > **Egress-enforced and service usages need a named grant** > `secrets: all` grants environment exposure only. An egress-enforced secret, and > any secret a TaskStation service spends, needs its identifier written out in an > agent's list. A project with no `agents:` block in `taskstation.yaml` never receives > one. An ungranted secret is dropped silently: the session starts normally and > the first call to the host fails as though the credential were wrong. ### From the dashboard The Secrets page marks a secret no agent can receive: **No agent can receive this secret**. Choose an agent there and confirm. TaskStation edits `taskstation.yaml` and commits it as `chore(agents): grant to `. The grant works whether or not the manifest already declares that agent. An agent the manifest does not declare gets a new entry holding this one `secrets` list. An agent that is already declared keeps every other field — model, tools, connectors — and the identifier joins its existing list. An agent that already admits the identifier needs no commit, and TaskStation makes none. An agent on `secrets: all` is a special case. `all` cannot carry an egress-enforced secret, so TaskStation writes an explicit list: every identifier the project has today, plus this one. Nothing the agent receives today changes. A secret you add later needs its own grant. Two cases refuse the grant: - A project on `taskstation_version: 1` (`taskstation.toml`) has no agents map to edit. The request fails with `400` and `manifest_v1_unsupported`. Edit the manifest by hand, or move the project to `taskstation_version: 2`. - A secret that is **Disabled** has nothing to deliver. The request fails with `409` and `secret_not_grantable`. Give it an exposure first. If the project has no `agents:` block yet, read [The first `agents:` block changes the whole project](#the-first-agents-block-changes-the-whole-project) before you confirm. That one edit changes secret access for every other agent. ### By hand The same grant, written directly: ```yaml taskstation_version: 2 agents: my-agent: secrets: [STRIPE_API_KEY] ``` ### The first `agents:` block changes the whole project > **Declaring one agent denies the rest** > A project with no `agents:` block — or with no `taskstation.yaml` at all — is > ungoverned: every agent receives every environment-exposure secret, and no > agent receives an egress-enforced one. > > The moment the project declares its first agent, every agent that is **not** > listed receives no project secret at all — including environment secrets that > worked a minute earlier. Listing one agent revokes the rest. So list every agent that needs secrets, not only the one you are fixing. This is why the dashboard asks you to confirm the first time: after that commit, `agents:` is the project's allow-list, and an agent missing from it runs with no project secrets. ## Exposing capabilities to third-party users > **TaskStation secret policies are not a multi-tenant authorization system** > A secret policy protects **your project's own agent** from leaking your own > credential. It says nothing about which of your end users may spend it. If you are building something where **untrusted third-party users** reach a capability — a public chat surface, a shared app, an agent anyone on the internet can prompt — do not hand them secret policies at all. Every user of that surface shares one project agent, one grant, and one host list. TaskStation has no way to tell one of your customers from another, so an egress-enforced secret that any user's prompt can reach is a credential every user can spend, up to the full scope the upstream key carries. Build the boundary you actually need, on your side: 1. Stand up your own authorization and proxy service. It holds the upstream credential. 2. Point the agent at your service, not at the upstream. Give the agent only a credential for your service — that one can be egress-enforced to your own host. 3. Your service identifies the end user, applies your own authorization rules and per-user quotas, and only then makes the upstream call with the credential it holds. That service is where per-user rules belong: who may call what, how often, for which records. TaskStation secret exposure is one layer below it, and it does not substitute for it. ## List your secrets Run `taskstation secrets ls` to see which secrets a project declares and which ones have a value set. The list is configuration metadata. It never returns secret values. A scoped agent token sees only identifiers in its agent grant. A session-specific `secrets_allowlist` controls delivery into that session, but it does not hide configuration metadata that the agent grant permits. ## Rotate a secret ### Set a new value Run the same command with the new value, or set it again on the project's Secrets page: ```bash taskstation secrets set STRIPE_API_KEY=sk_live_new... ``` ### TaskStation pushes it to running sessions TaskStation pushes the change to every sandbox with an active session for the project, on a best-effort basis. For model or gateway credentials, TaskStation restarts the OpenCode compatibility process. Rotating an egress-enforced secret needs no push of the value at all: the sandbox holds a handle, and TaskStation reads the current value when the next request comes through. ## Remove a secret Run `taskstation secrets unset STRIPE_API_KEY` (or `unset `), or delete it from the project's Secrets page. > **Removal is immediate, propagation is not** > TaskStation deletes a shared secret right away. Push to already-running > sandboxes is best-effort, the same as rotation. ## Share a value without seeing it Run `taskstation secrets request STRIPE_API_KEY` to create a link. Anyone with the link can enter the value. You never see it. Links stay valid for 7 days by default; adjust with `--expires ` (max 30 days). An expired link shows a clear "expired" page — mint a fresh one with the same command. ## End-to-end example `taskstation.yaml`: ```yaml taskstation_version: 2 default_agent: my-agent agents: my-agent: secrets: [STRIPE_API_KEY] ``` Secret configuration. The first command stores the value with the default environment exposure. The second moves it to egress-enforced exposure, which is experimental and needs the `secrets_egress` flag (Settings → Feature flags); it returns `403` `feature_disabled` while the flag is off. ```bash taskstation secrets set STRIPE_API_KEY=sk_live_... taskstation secrets delivery STRIPE_API_KEY egress --allow-host api.stripe.com ``` The agent then calls Stripe with the variable it was given: ```bash curl -s -o /dev/null -w '%{http_code}\n' \ -H "authorization: Bearer $STRIPE_API_KEY" \ https://api.stripe.com/v1/customers # expected: 200 ``` `$STRIPE_API_KEY` holds a handle. Stripe receives the real key, because `api.stripe.com` is on the list. The same request to a host that is not on the list sends the handle, and the upstream rejects it. The same request from an agent whose `secrets` list omits `STRIPE_API_KEY` returns `401`. That session starts normally — an ungranted secret is not an error, it is simply never delivered. ## CLI commands | Command | What it does | |---|---| | `taskstation secrets ls` | List secrets declared and set for the project | | `taskstation secrets set KEY=VALUE [--identifier ]` | Create or update a secret. `KEY=-` reads the value from stdin | | `taskstation secrets unset IDENTIFIER` | Remove a secret | | `taskstation secrets delivery IDENTIFIER egress --allow-host ` | Egress-enforced exposure for the listed hosts. Experimental; needs the `secrets_egress` flag | | `taskstation secrets delivery IDENTIFIER runtime` | Environment exposure (the default) | | `taskstation secrets delivery IDENTIFIER denied` | Disabled | | `taskstation secrets call IDENTIFIER URL` | Send one policy-bound HTTPS request through TaskStation. Experimental; needs the `secrets_egress` flag | | `taskstation secrets sync` | Re-push project secrets to this session's sandbox | | `taskstation secrets request NAME [--scope runtime\|connector] [--expires ]` | Create a link so someone else can enter a value | | `taskstation env push --from ` | Upload a `.env` file as secrets | | `taskstation env pull [--out ] [--force]` | Export secret names, not values, to a `.env` file | The CLI keeps the stored vocabulary: `runtime` is environment exposure, `egress` is egress-enforced, `denied` is disabled. Run `taskstation secrets --help` for every flag. Setup links default to `connector`. Use `--scope runtime` only when the agent's shell must receive the value. A secret bound to a connector stays server-side. ## Names and permissions Format rules for the two names: | Name | Format | |---|---| | `identifier` | `^[A-Za-z0-9][A-Za-z0-9_.-]{0,127}$` | | `name` | `^[A-Z_][A-Z0-9_]{0,63}$` | Reading or writing a secret needs the `project.secret.read` or `project.secret.write` permission. A project manager holds both. A custom role only adds permissions — TaskStation has no deny rule — so no role can withhold either one from a manager. To restrict a manager, remove the manager role. Delivery to a session is the role verdict of the person who started it, intersected with the launched agent's manifest grant. Both must allow the secret. See [One vocabulary, two bindings](/docs/accounts#one-vocabulary-two-bindings). ## REST routes All routes sit under `/v1/projects/{projectId}`. | Method | Path | Description | |---|---|---| | GET | `/secrets` | List secrets. Scoped to the caller's grant if the caller is a scoped agent token. | | POST | `/secrets` | Create or update the shared value. Body: `{name, identifier?, value}`, plus an optional delivery policy. | | PUT | `/secrets/{identifier}/strategy` | Change the exposure and its host list. | | POST | `/secrets/{identifier}/grant` | Add the identifier to one agent's `secrets` list in `taskstation.yaml`. Body: `{agent}`. | | DELETE | `/secrets/{name}` | Delete the shared value. Personal overrides stay in place. | | PUT | `/secrets/{name}/personal` | Set or turn on the caller's personal override. | | DELETE | `/secrets/{name}/personal` | Remove the caller's personal override. | `POST /secrets` rejects names that start with `TASKSTATION_`. It returns `409` if the `identifier` already exists with a different `name`. It rejects the exact name `CODEX_AUTH_JSON` with `400` — TaskStation manages that secret through ChatGPT subscription onboarding. Both write routes return a `delivery_sync` object when the change had to reach running sandboxes. `ok: false` means the value is saved but at least one live session still uses the previous one; the listed sessions pick it up on restart. A secret in the list carries `delivery_blocked_reason`. The value `no_agent_grant` means no agent can receive this secret. `null` means it is granted, the exposure needs no grant, or TaskStation could not read the manifest. `POST /secrets/{identifier}/grant` clears that reason. It returns `already_granted: true` when the agent's list already admits the identifier, in which case TaskStation commits nothing. It returns `adopted_governance: true` when the edit added the project's first `agents:` block — the change [described above](#grant-a-secret-to-an-agent). It answers `400` `manifest_v1_unsupported` for a `taskstation.toml` project and `409` `secret_not_grantable` for a disabled secret. ## Rotation and propagation A secret write does not wait for a session restart. TaskStation pushes the change to every active sandbox in the project: 1. TaskStation builds a new environment snapshot, using the running agent's `secrets` grant. 2. The sandbox writes the snapshot to the live agent environment. New tool calls pick up the change right away. 3. If the changed secret is an LLM provider credential, TaskStation restarts OpenCode. This push is best-effort. The API call that changes the secret returns before the push finishes. A failed push is only logged, not retried. A sandbox with a failed push keeps the old value until the next successful push, or until the session restarts. ## Model credentials A project on TaskStation's managed model access needs no key of its own. To bring your own, set the provider variables your OpenCode provider config references. A recognized model key is assigned the **LLM gateway** usage, which spends it server-side; it needs no sandbox presence. Do not use a generic provider verification result as runtime proof. It cannot prove the selected model, region, entitlement, and API dialect. Send a real prompt through the exact model.