Can we store tokens in one place and use them as smart values in Jira automation web requests?

[Prasad Bonthu]

In Jira automation, we are currently passing tokens directly in the web request action. Is there a way to store these tokens in a central location (similar to a CMDB) and then reference them as smart values when making web requests?

This would help us avoid hardcoding tokens in multiple rules and make maintenance easier.

[Matteo Vecchiato]

Hi @Prasad Bonthu ,

Thank you for your interesting question.

If you manage differents tokens, you could store the tokens in Assets inside Jira Service Management (it's like a CMDB), in a specific object type. Then, inside automation, you can use the lookup function to query the Assets.

Assets requires a Premium license to be activated.

Another solution is to use an external Key Vault (like Azure vault) and call it from automation though web request.

I hope it helps

[Prasad Bonthu]

Thanks for the suggestions. We already have some CMDB objects created to maintain project data, so we’ll plan to use the CMDB to store the API tokens as well.

Appreciate your guidance!

[Prasad Bonthu]

@Matteo Vecchiato 
Is there any Object Attribute type in Assets/CMDB that supports storing passwords or secret values in an encrypted way, instead of showing the actual value in plain text?

By default, I don’t see such an option available it mostly supports text, URL, or number types. Is there any recommended approach to securely store API tokens or sensitive data in Assets?

[Matteo Vecchiato]

Hi @Prasad Bonthu ,

In asset there isn't any attribute type for passwords/secrets.

You could try to store in a string field with encoding in Base64 or similar, but then you will have the difficulty on how to decode with Automation such string, because the smart values in Automation doesn't offer any advanced decode functions, only the basic json, html, url encoding/decoding.

The most secure method is to store the secrets in a Vault and get the data from a api call.

Please consider to mark this response as acepted answer to help further users.

Kind regards

[Prasad Bonthu]

Well said.
I ran into a challenge the token in Base64 format is too long (over 255 characters) to store as an attribute. Is there a way to handle this in the CMDB?

[Marc - Devoteam]

Hi @Prasad Bonthu 

@Matteo Vecchiato has valid options, you could also use a lookup table in automation to store the tokens

[Prasad Bonthu]

I have multiple automation rules where we use different web requests. To simplify maintenance, we want to store the tokens in a centralized location instead of hardcoding them separately in each rule.

Currently, we have CMDB objects created for data maintenance. I was wondering if, apart from CMDB, there are other options to securely manage token data.

Would using a lookup table in Jira automation be sufficient for this requirement, or is there a better approach to centrally and securely store tokens for reuse across rules?

[Marc - Devoteam]

Hi @Prasad Bonthu 

@Matteo Vecchiato 

Is right if you want to store them safely, use a vault option and a web request action in automation to trigger an API to get the required token.

Storing them inside Jira there is no decrypted solution, the only more safe option, would be to create a separate assets schema and only have some users be able to read from this schema, the users who need to use the API token.