Secret Management

Configure AWS Secrets Manager, GCP Secret Manager, or HashiCorp Vault in Bifrost Helm deployments

Secret Management is an enterprise-only feature. It requires the enterprise Bifrost image and a PostgreSQL config store.

Connect an external secret manager so provider keys and other credentials are never stored in Bifrost’s database. Configure vaultStore under storage.configStore in your values file.

Once connected, any secret field in your values file accepts a vault.<path> reference in place of a plaintext value or env.* reference. See Secret Management for the full list of supported fields, access modes, and secret rotation.

---

Configuration

AWS Secrets Manager

IAM role (recommended)

Attach an IAM role to your pod via IRSA and leave credentials unset - the AWS SDK inherits the role automatically.

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: aws-secrets-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      aws:
        region: us-east-1

Static credentials

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: aws-secrets-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      aws:
        region: us-east-1
        accessKeyId: env.AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
        secretAccessKey: env.AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY

accessKeyId and secretAccessKey must be set together.

Role assumption

Assume a cross-account or restricted IAM role on top of any existing credential source.

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: aws-secrets-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      aws:
        region: us-east-1
        roleArn: arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/BifrostSecretsReader

AWS fields

Field	Required	Description
region	No	AWS region (e.g. us-east-1). Falls back to AWS_DEFAULT_REGION or instance metadata if unset.
accessKeyId	No	Required when not using IAM roles. Must be set with secretAccessKey.
secretAccessKey	No	Must be set with accessKeyId.
sessionToken	No	For STS-issued temporary credentials.
roleArn	No	IAM role to assume via STS.
kmsKeyId	No	KMS key for encrypting new secrets (read_and_write only).

GCP Secret Manager

Workload Identity (recommended)

Bind a GCP service account to your GKE pod and omit credentials - ADC is used automatically.

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: gcp-secret-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      gcp:
        projectId: my-gcp-project

Service account key

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: gcp-secret-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      gcp:
        projectId: my-gcp-project
        credentialsJson: env.GCP_CREDENTIALS_JSON

credentialsJson accepts a JSON string (the full key file contents) or a file path on disk.

GCP fields

Field	Required	Description
projectId	Yes	GCP project containing your secrets.
credentialsJson	No	Service account key JSON string or file path. If omitted, Application Default Credentials are used.

HashiCorp Vault

Bifrost uses the KV v2 secrets engine. Auth is resolved in order: explicit token → AppRole → ambient VAULT_TOKEN env var.

Token

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: hashicorp-vault
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      hashicorp:
        address: https://vault.internal:8200
        token: env.VAULT_TOKEN

AppRole

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: hashicorp-vault
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      hashicorp:
        address: https://vault.internal:8200
        mountPath: secret
        roleId: env.VAULT_ROLE_ID
        secretId: env.VAULT_SECRET_ID

Ambient token

If VAULT_TOKEN is set in the environment and no token or AppRole is configured, Bifrost inherits it automatically. Useful with Vault Agent injection.

storage:
  configStore:
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: hashicorp-vault
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_only
      hashicorp:
        address: https://vault.internal:8200

HashiCorp fields

Field	Required	Description
address	No	Vault server URL. Reads VAULT_ADDR env var if unset.
token	No	Vault token.
namespace	No	Vault namespace (HCP Vault / Vault Enterprise).
mountPath	No	KV v2 mount path. Defaults to secret.
roleId	No	AppRole role ID. Must be set together with secretId.
secretId	No	AppRole secret ID. Must be set together with roleId.

---

Common fields

These apply regardless of backend:

Field	Required	Description
enabled	Yes	Enable vault integration.
type	Yes	Backend: aws-secrets-manager, gcp-secret-manager, or hashicorp-vault.
prefix	No	Path prefix for Bifrost-managed secrets. Defaults to bifrost.
accessMode	No	read_only (default) - resolve refs only. read_and_write - also auto-store plaintext values and delete owned secrets on removal.

---

Using vault references

Once configured, any secret field accepts a vault.<path> reference:

bifrost:
  providers:
    openai:
      keys:
        - value: vault.bifrost/providers/openai/key
          models:
            - gpt-4o
            - gpt-4o-mini

---

Full example

# vault-values.yaml
storage:
  configStore:
    type: postgres
    vaultStore:
      enabled: true
      type: aws-secrets-manager
      prefix: bifrost
      accessMode: read_and_write
      aws:
        region: us-east-1

bifrost:
  providers:
    openai:
      keys:
        - value: vault.bifrost/providers/openai/key
          models:
            - gpt-4o
            - gpt-4o-mini
    anthropic:
      keys:
        - value: vault.bifrost/providers/anthropic/key
          models:
            - claude-opus-4-8
            - claude-sonnet-4-6

helm install bifrost bifrost/bifrost -f vault-values.yaml