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🚨 Break glass

Break-glass is for an emergency: a system is down, and the secret you need is checked out by someone else, or waiting on an approval nobody can give in time. It skips those steps, and in exchange it's loud: the owners are told at once, the value is rotated afterwards, and the record is kept at the highest audit level.

It isn't a way around permissions. You can only break the glass on a secret you can already read.

🔨 Break the glass on a secret​

Before you start​

  • You can read the secret.
  • You're signed in to the web app yourself, not through a token.
  • You have your authenticator app: break-glass takes a six-digit authenticator code.

Steps​

  1. Open the secret and, in its Actions menu, choose Break glass….
  2. Read what will happen:
    • Every field is revealed, skipping check-out and pending approvals.
    • The folder's owners are notified straight away.
    • The secret is queued for rotation once you're done.
  3. Under Reason, say what the emergency is. Keep it specific: the owners and any later review read it.
  4. Type a fresh Authenticator code. Break-glass always asks for one, whatever your step-up window says.
  5. Choose Break glass.

Every field of the secret is shown, with copy buttons, and the page shows a hard-to-miss Break glass active marker. Hide and end closes it when you're done.

If the code is wrong the page says That code didn't work. Try again. and nothing is revealed.

🔒 Who can and can't​

  • Only a person, signed in to the web app. Agents, the MCP server, personal tokens, service accounts and any other API token can't break the glass: the server refuses them, whatever the client sends.
  • Only on a secret you can read. For a secret you can't read, ask for access instead (Requests and approvals).

🧾 Afterwards​

  • A rotatable secret is rotated, so the value that was exposed during the emergency stops working.
  • The break-glass reveal is in the audit trail at the audit tier, with your reason, apart from routine reveals. It's the first thing a post-incident review looks at.

Site admins have a wider version for secrets in other people's personal folders; see Break-glass in the Admin guide.