[chef] Re: Re: Re: Re: Handling of encrypted data bag keys

[Thom May < >]

We use private S3 buckets for a bunch of stuff, so pulling the databag key from there isn't a big stretch.

I just wrote https://github.com/thommay/chef-encrypted-databags (lightly tested, if it breaks you get to keep both pieces, etc) to do that.

-t

On Thu, Apr 11, 2013 at 6:05 PM, Moser, Kevin < " target="_blank"> > wrote:

We are asking a very similar question ourselves.  We are using encrypted data bags to store passwords and certificates.  We ended up writing what we are calling chef-vault (distributed as a ruby gem, source at github.com/moserke/chef-vault).  It uses the chef client key to encrypt the shared secret for the host that needs to decrypt it.  That host can now use it's private key to decrypt the shared secret to then go to the real data bag and decrypt the password.

This does have minor chicken and egg issue for a boot strap, as you need the client to run with the validator to get it's pem so that you can use the knife plugins in the gem.  For us this works ok because we converge the box into the base role first (which doesn't need the encrypted values) do the encryption for that host and then put the host into the application role that needs the encrypted value.

This approach takes the need out of the client ever needing to "store" or have local the secret as it's all stored in data bags and protected by the clients private key.

Kevin

From: Thom May < "> <mailto: "> >>
Reply-To: " "> <mailto: "> >" < "> <mailto: "> >>
Date: Thursday, April 11, 2013 5:13 AM
To: " "> <mailto: "> >" < "> <mailto: "> >>
Subject: [chef] Re: Re: Handling of encrypted data bag keys

thanks, but that's not really the problem I want to solve.

On Thu, Apr 11, 2013 at 12:49 PM, Sachin Sagar Rai < "> <mailto: "> >> wrote:
You can put the following line in knife.rb file


encrypted_data_bag_secret "#{home_dir}/.chef/encrypted_data_bag_secret"


Now, whenever you bootstrap the node on ec2, it will be copied over the node automatically.

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On Thursday, April 11, 2013 at 4:45 PM, Thom May wrote:

Hey,
how are people handling the distribution of encryption keys for data bags? It seems unfortunate to have to copy out the encryption key at bootstrap time, but having it as a cookbook file is daft.
So then I was thinking I'd have the key on a private s3 bucket, which could then be accessed with signed urls.
But then I thought, if we're doing that, why bother putting the file on disk at all? Just download the contents at the start of the chef run, use it for the duration, and let the key go away when the chef process dies.
Am I missing something?
-T