netbox-community-netbox/docs/api/working-with-secrets.md

Working with Secrets

As with most other objects, the NetBox API can be used to create, modify, and delete secrets. However, additional steps are needed to encrypt or decrypt secret data.

Generating a Session Key

In order to encrypt or decrypt secret data, a session key must be attached to the API request. To generate a session key, send an authenticated request to the /api/secrets/get-session-key/ endpoint with the private RSA key which matches your UserKey. The private key must be POSTed with the name private_key.

$ curl -X POST http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/get-session-key/ \
-H "Authorization: Token c639d619ecbeb1f3055c4141ba6870e20572edd7" \
-H "Accept: application/json; indent=4" \
--data-urlencode "private_key@<filename>"
{
    "session_key": "dyEnxlc9lnGzaOAV1dV/xqYPV63njIbdZYOgnAlGPHk="
}

!!! note To read the private key from a file, use the convention above. Alternatively, the private key can be read from an environment variable using --data-urlencode "private_key=$PRIVATE_KEY".

The request uses your private key to unlock your stored copy of the master key and generate a session key which can be attached in the X-Session-Key header of future API requests.

Retrieving Secrets

A session key is not needed to retrieve unencrypted secrets: The secret is returned like any normal object with its plaintext field set to null.

$ curl http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secrets/2587/ \
-H "Authorization: Token c639d619ecbeb1f3055c4141ba6870e20572edd7" \
-H "Accept: application/json; indent=4"
{
    "id": 2587,
    "device": {
        "id": 1827,
        "url": "http://localhost:8000/api/dcim/devices/1827/",
        "name": "MyTestDevice",
        "display_name": "MyTestDevice"
    },
    "role": {
        "id": 1,
        "url": "http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secret-roles/1/",
        "name": "Login Credentials",
        "slug": "login-creds"
    },
    "name": "admin",
    "plaintext": null,
    "hash": "pbkdf2_sha256$1000$G6mMFe4FetZQ$f+0itZbAoUqW5pd8+NH8W5rdp/2QNLIBb+LGdt4OSKA=",
    "created": "2017-03-21",
    "last_updated": "2017-03-21T19:28:44.265582Z"
}

To decrypt a secret, we must include our session key in the X-Session-Key header:

$ curl http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secrets/2587/ \
-H "Authorization: Token c639d619ecbeb1f3055c4141ba6870e20572edd7" \
-H "Accept: application/json; indent=4" \
-H "X-Session-Key: dyEnxlc9lnGzaOAV1dV/xqYPV63njIbdZYOgnAlGPHk="
{
    "id": 2587,
    "device": {
        "id": 1827,
        "url": "http://localhost:8000/api/dcim/devices/1827/",
        "name": "MyTestDevice",
        "display_name": "MyTestDevice"
    },
    "role": {
        "id": 1,
        "url": "http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secret-roles/1/",
        "name": "Login Credentials",
        "slug": "login-creds"
    },
    "name": "admin",
    "plaintext": "foobar",
    "hash": "pbkdf2_sha256$1000$G6mMFe4FetZQ$f+0itZbAoUqW5pd8+NH8W5rdp/2QNLIBb+LGdt4OSKA=",
    "created": "2017-03-21",
    "last_updated": "2017-03-21T19:28:44.265582Z"
}

Lists of secrets can be decrypted in this manner as well:

$ curl http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secrets/?limit=3 \
-H "Authorization: Token c639d619ecbeb1f3055c4141ba6870e20572edd7" \
-H "Accept: application/json; indent=4" \
-H "X-Session-Key: dyEnxlc9lnGzaOAV1dV/xqYPV63njIbdZYOgnAlGPHk="
{
    "count": 3482,
    "next": "http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secrets/?limit=3&offset=3",
    "previous": null,
    "results": [
        {
            "id": 2587,
            ...
            "plaintext": "foobar",
            ...
        },
        {
            "id": 2588,
            ...
            "plaintext": "MyP@ssw0rd!",
            ...
        },
        {
            "id": 2589,
            ...
            "plaintext": "AnotherSecret!",
            ...
        },
    ]
}

Creating Secrets

Session keys are also used to decrypt new or modified secrets. This is done by setting the plaintext field of the submitted object:

$ curl -X POST http://localhost:8000/api/secrets/secrets/ \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "Authorization: Token c639d619ecbeb1f3055c4141ba6870e20572edd7" \
-H "Accept: application/json; indent=4" \
-H "X-Session-Key: dyEnxlc9lnGzaOAV1dV/xqYPV63njIbdZYOgnAlGPHk=" \
--data '{"device": 1827, "role": 1, "name": "backup", "plaintext": "Drowssap1"}'
{
    "id": 2590,
    "device": 1827,
    "role": 1,
    "name": "backup",
    "plaintext": "Drowssap1"
}

!!! note Don't forget to include the Content-Type: application/json header when making a POST request.