How to Create and Use Kubernetes Secrets

Published: August 12, 2020 by Author's Photo Shane Rainville | Reading time: 2 minutes
Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

Secrets are any sensitive information used by applications and services. Nearly all applications use sensitive configuration information, from database credentials to TLS\SSL certificates. For obvious security reasons, it is a good proactive to keep your code separate from your secrets.

Kubernetes Secrets allow us to store our sensitive information separately from our resources that use it. In this tutorial, you will learn how to create secrets in Kubernetes, and also how to use those secrets in your other resources, such as pods and deployments.

Creating Secrets

To begin we will create secrets from the shell using kubectl. The basic syntax of the kubectl create secret command is the following.

kubectl create secret <type> <name> <flags>

There are three types of secrets that can be created from the command-line:

  • docker-registry
  • generic
  • tls

Generic Literal Strings

To set a secret using a string from the command-line, use the --from-literal flag. There is no limit to the number of --from-literal flags that can be used.

kubectl create secret generic example-secrets --from-literal=db.password=super-secret-password

Generic From File

Alternatively, secrets can be imported from a properties file. The syntax for creating secrets from a file

kubectl create secret generic example-secrets --from-file=<filepath>

For example, a properties file named DB-credentials.txt has bas the following content.

db.password=super-secret-password
db.user=app1-prod

To create secrets for db.password and db.user in a secret named example-secrets, the following kubectl command would be executed.

kubectl create secret generic example-secrets --from-file=db-credentials.txt

Secrets Manifests

Storing secrets manifests in a git repository could leak sensitive information.
A Secrets manifest is another option for creating Kubernetes secrets. The Kubernetes API for secrets is fairly basic, where properties are defined in a data key.

The example fellow adds data keys for a web application: db.password, db.user, and certificate. Look carefully at the values for each key. While the db.password and db.user could pass clear text values, the certificate value is obviously not a clear text certificate. All values under the data key of a Secrets manifest must be Base64 encoded.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Secrets
metadata:
  name: my-secrets
data:
  db.password: c3VwZXItc2VjcmV0LXBhc3N3b3Jk
  db.user: ZGVtby1hcHAtcHJvZA==
  certificate: 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 

If you are running OSX or Linux you likely have a base64 command available out-of-the-box. To encode a string value as base64, you can run the following command:

echo -n 'my-secret-text' | base64
| output
Xktc2VjcmV0LXRleHQ=

Accessing Secrets as Environment Variables

Accessing Secrets in mounted volumes

Base64 encoding secrets

Using strings as secrets

Author Photo
Blogger, Developer, pipeline builder, cloud engineer, and DevSecOps specialist. I have been working in the cloud for over a decade and running containized workloads since 2012, with gigs at small startups to large financial enterprises.

How to Effectively use Kubernetes Quality of Service

Publised October 6, 2021 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

Running Nfs in Kubernetes

Publised June 24, 2021 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

Know What's in Your Container Images

Publised June 23, 2021 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

How to Deploy Jekyll on Kubernetes

Publised September 15, 2020 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

How to Update Kubernetes Deployments

Publised September 11, 2020 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

How to Configure Node-based apps in Kubernetes

Publised September 9, 2020 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

How to Backup and Restore MongoDB Deployment on Kubernetes

Publised September 3, 2020 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.

How to Immediately Start Kubernetes CronJobs Manually

Publised September 2, 2020 by Shane Rainville

Learn how to securely store your sensitive information in Kubernetes secrets and access those secrets in your manifests.