stacklok / stacklok/toolhive

Add Secret Management Support for Remote Servers Bearer Tokens

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#1,747 1 comment 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

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authentication enhancement
Dominant language
Go
Stars
2.2k
Forks
300
Avg merge
1d 15h
Merged PRs (30d)
184

Description

We need a way to securely provide authentication (e.g., headers, bearer tokens) when connecting to remote MCP servers. Right now, there’s no dedicated mechanism for secret management for remote MCP servers, which leads to hardcoding or less secure workarounds.

Initial Scope
  • Start simple with support for injecting a single secret (e.g., API key or bearer token).
Future Extensibility
  • Allow integration with external secret providers (Vault, OAuth proxy, cloud secret managers, etc.).
  • Support dynamic secret resolution based on a combination of caller identity and server identity.
  • Consider secret rotation and refresh flows.
Motivation
  • Securely manage authentication for remote MCP servers.
  • Enable flexible setups where secrets are resolved dynamically.
  • Avoid embedding sensitive information directly in configs.

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by locating the remote MCP server connection and configuration paths, then review how authentication headers and bearer tokens are currently handled. Define the initial single-secret injection behavior and its security boundaries before considering external providers, identity-based resolution, or rotation. Done means remote servers can receive one secret without embedding it directly in configuration.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
go
Domain
backend, security
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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