| GIT-SECRETS() | GIT-SECRETS() |
git-secrets - Prevents you from committing passwords and other sensitive information to a git repository.
git secrets --scan [-r|--recursive] [--cached] [--no-index] [--untracked] [<files>...] git secrets --scan-history git secrets --install [-f|--force] [<target-directory>] git secrets --list [--global] git secrets --add [-a|--allowed] [-l|--literal] [--global] <pattern> git secrets --add-provider [--global] <command> [arguments...] git secrets --register-aws [--global] git secrets --aws-provider [<credentials-file>]
git-secrets scans commits, commit messages, and --no-ff merges to prevent adding secrets into your git repositories. If a commit, commit message, or any commit in a --no-ff merge history matches one of your configured prohibited regular expression patterns, then the commit is rejected.
git-secrets must be placed somewhere in your PATH so that it is picked up by git when running git secrets.
You can use the install target of the provided Makefile to install git secrets and the man page. You can customize the install path using the PREFIX and MANPREFIX variables.
make install
Run the provided install.ps1 powershell script. This will copy the needed files to an installation directory (%USERPROFILE%/.git-secrets by default) and add the directory to the current user PATH.
PS > ./install.ps1
brew install git-secrets
WARNING:
Here's a quick example of how to ensure a git repository is scanned for secrets on each commit:
cd /path/to/my/repo git secrets --install git secrets --register-aws
Add a configuration template if you want to add hooks to all repositories you initialize or clone in the future.
git secrets --register-aws --global
Add hooks to all your local repositories.
git secrets --install ~/.git-templates/git-secrets git config --global init.templateDir ~/.git-templates/git-secrets
Add custom providers to scan for security credentials.
git secrets --add-provider -- cat /path/to/secret/file/patterns
With git-secrets is also possible to scan a repository including all revisions:
git secrets --scan-history
Each of these options must appear first on the command line.
NOTE:
If the provided <target-directory> is not in a git repository, the directory will be created and hooks will be placed in <target-directory>/hooks. This can be useful for creating git template directories using with git init --template <target-directory>.
You can run git init on a repository that has already been initialized. From the git init documentation:
The following git hooks are installed:
NOTE:
Install git hooks to the current directory:
cd /path/to/my/repository git secrets --install
Install git hooks to a repository other than the current directory:
git secrets --install /path/to/my/repository
Create a git template that has git-secrets installed, and then copy that template into a git repository:
git secrets --install ~/.git-templates/git-secrets git init --template ~/.git-templates/git-secrets
Overwrite existing hooks if present:
git secrets --install -f
-r cannot be used alongside --cached, --no-index, or --untracked.
If no files are provided, all files returned by git ls-files are scanned.
Scan all files in the repo:
git secrets --scan
Scans a single file for secrets:
git secrets --scan /path/to/file
Scans a directory recursively for secrets:
git secrets --scan -r /path/to/directory
Scans multiple files for secrets:
git secrets --scan /path/to/file /path/to/other/file
You can scan by globbing:
git secrets --scan /path/to/directory/*
Scan from stdin:
echo 'hello!' | git secrets --scan -
Adds a prohibited pattern to the current repo:
git secrets --add '[A-Z0-9]{20}'
Adds a prohibited pattern to the global git config:
git secrets --add --global '[A-Z0-9]{20}'
Adds a string that is scanned for literally (+ is escaped):
git secrets --add --literal 'foo+bar'
Add an allowed pattern:
git secrets --add -a 'allowed pattern'
Registers a secret provider with arguments:
git secrets --add-provider -- git secrets --aws-provider
Cats secrets out of a file:
git secrets --add-provider -- cat /path/to/secret/file/patterns
egrep-compatible regular expressions are used to determine if a commit or commit message contains any prohibited patterns. These regular expressions are defined using the git config command. It is important to note that different systems use different versions of egrep. For example, when running on macOS, you will use a different version of egrep than when running on something like Ubuntu (BSD vs GNU).
You can add prohibited regular expression patterns to your git config using git secrets --add <pattern>.
Sometimes a regular expression might match false positives. For example, git commit SHAs look a lot like AWS access keys. You can specify many different regular expression patterns as false positives using the following command:
git secrets --add --allowed 'my regex pattern'
You can also add regular expressions patterns to filter false positives to a .gitallowed file located in the repository's root directory. Lines starting with # are skipped (comment line) and empty lines are also skipped.
First, git-secrets will extract all lines from a file that contain a prohibited match. Included in the matched results will be the full path to the name of the file that was matched, followed by ':', followed by the line number that was matched, followed by the entire line from the file that was matched by a secret pattern. Then, if you've defined allowed regular expressions, git-secrets will check to see if all of the matched lines match at least one of your registered allowed regular expressions. If all of the lines that were flagged as secret are canceled out by an allowed match, then the subject text does not contain any secrets. If any of the matched lines are not matched by an allowed regular expression, then git-secrets will fail the commit/merge/message.
IMPORTANT:
Sometimes you want to check for an exact pattern match against a set of known secrets. For example, you might want to ensure that no credentials present in ~/.aws/credentials ever show up in a commit. In these cases, it's better to leave these secrets in one location rather than spread them out across git repositories in git configs. You can use "secret providers" to fetch these types of credentials. A secret provider is an executable that when invoked outputs prohibited patterns separated by new lines.
You can add secret providers using the --add-provider command:
git secrets --add-provider -- git secrets --aws-provider
Notice the use of --. This ensures that any arguments associated with the provider are passed to the provider each time it is invoked when scanning for secrets.
Let's take a look at an example. Given the following subject text (stored in /tmp/example):
This is a test! password=ex@mplepassword password=****** More test...
And the following registered patterns:
git secrets --add 'password\s*=\s*.+' git secrets --add --allowed --literal 'ex@mplepassword'
Running git secrets --scan /tmp/example, the result will result in the following error output:
/tmp/example:3:password=****** [ERROR] Matched prohibited pattern Possible mitigations: - Mark false positives as allowed using: git config --add secrets.allowed ... - List your configured patterns: git config --get-all secrets.patterns - List your configured allowed patterns: git config --get-all secrets.allowed - Use --no-verify if this is a one-time false positive
Breaking this down, the prohibited pattern value of password\s*=\s*.+ will match the following lines:
/tmp/example:2:password=ex@mplepassword /tmp/example:3:password=******
...But the first match will be filtered out due to the fact that it matches the allowed regular expression of ex@mplepassword. Because there is still a remaining line that did not match, it is considered a secret.
Because that matching lines are placed on lines that start with the filename and line number (e.g., /tmp/example:3:...), you can create allowed patterns that take filenames and line numbers into account in the regular expression. For example, you could whitelist an entire file using something like:
git secrets --add --allowed '/tmp/example:.*' git secrets --scan /tmp/example && echo $? # Outputs: 0
Alternatively, you could allow a specific line number of a file if that line is unlikely to change using something like the following:
git secrets --add --allowed '/tmp/example:3:.*' git secrets --scan /tmp/example && echo $? # Outputs: 0
Keep this in mind when creating allowed patterns to ensure that your allowed patterns are not inadvertently matched due to the fact that the filename is included in the subject text that allowed patterns are matched against.
Use the --no-verify option in the event of a false positive match in a commit, merge, or commit message. This will skip the execution of the git hook and allow you to make the commit or merge.
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