This Python module allows you to manage secrets for Saltstack via Passbolt. This makes managing secrets easier than manually encrypting them and storing the encrpyted password in the Saltstack repository.
Additionally, it is possible to only have one source of truth for passwords for users and IT infrastructure while being able to manage access for each password. That means that all users can contribute to the Saltack configuration and manage (view/add/change) secrets within their responsibility.
Go to your Salt master and install the module with salt-pip
salt-pip install passbolt-salt
This will install this module and its dependencies.
Create a Passbolt account for the Salt master.
Copy the private and public PGP key files to /etc/salt
.
Import the new Passbolt private key on the Salt master:
gpg --import /etc/salt/passbolt_private.asc
Create a /etc/salt/passbolt.ini
file with the following content:
[PASSBOLT]
SERVER = https://passbolt.example.com
#SERVER_PUBLIC_KEY_FILE = <optional: server_public.asc>
USER_FINGERPRINT = [REPLACE WITH GPG KEY FINGERPRINT]
USER_PUBLIC_KEY_FILE = /etc/salt/passbolt_public.asc
USER_PRIVATE_KEY_FILE = /etc/salt/passbolt_private.asc
PASSPHRASE = [REPLACE WITH PASSBOLT USER PASSWORD]
Change file permissions:
chown salt /etc/salt/passbolt*
chmod 600 /etc/salt/passbolt*
Look into the example directory to see how the integration is done.
Create Pillar sls files for the different Salt minions, insert the content below and replace the group UUID.
#!py
def run():
from salt_passbolt import fetch_passbolt_passwords
return fetch_passbolt_passwords("27b9abd4-af9b-4c9e-9af1-cf8cb963680c")
Hint: you can find the group UUID in the URL of the Passbolt admin interface when editing a group.
In a state, reference secrets with their UUID. See the example/salt/important_secrets/files/secret.conf
.
password={{ pillar['passbolt']['3ec2a739-8e51-4c67-89fb-4bbfe9147e17'] }}
Hint: you can find the secret UUID in the URL of your browser by clicking on the checkbox of a secret.
All passwords are decrypted with a single process (gpg-agent). If many minions need to access their Pillar at the same time, the gpg-agent becomes a bottleneck. To avoid this bottleneck, the Pillar cache can be enabled for the Salt master with pillar_cache: True
. The following crontab entry updates the Pillar cache twice a day:
0 */12 * * * rm -rf /var/cache/salt/master/pillar_cache/* && salt '*' -b1 pillar.items
If the Passbolt server is not available, for example during local development, a file with the following format can replace the Python code mentioned in step 8:
passbolt:
3ec2a739-8e51-4c67-89fb-4bbfe9147e17: MY_SECRET