Azure Key Vault task

• 12/07/2018
• 3 minutes to read
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Azure Pipelines

Overview

Use this task in a build or release pipeline to download secrets such as authentication keys, storage account keys, data encryption keys, .PFX files, and passwords from an Azure Key Vault instance. The task can be used to fetch the latest values of all or a subset of secrets from the vault, and set them as variables that can be used in subsequent tasks of a pipeline. The task is Node-based, and works with agents on Linux, macOS, and Windows.

Prerequisites

The task has the following pre-requisites:

• An Azure subscription linked to Azure Pipelines or Team Foundation Server using the Azure Resource Manager service connection.

• An Azure Key Vault containing the secrets.

You can create a key vault:

• In the Azure portal

• By using Azure PowerShell

• By using the Azure CLI

Add secrets to a key vault:

• By using the PowerShell cmdlet Set-AzureKeyVaultSecret. If the secret does not exist, this cmdlet creates it. If the secret already exists, this cmdlet creates a new version of that secret.

• By using the Azure CLI. To add a secret to a key vault, for example a secret named SQLPassword with the value Pa$$w0rd, type:

  az keyvault secret set --vault-name 'ContosoKeyVault' --name 'SQLPassword' --value 'Pa$$w0rd'

When you want to access secrets:

• Ensure the Azure service connection has at least Get and List permissions on the vault. You can set these permissions in the Azure portal:

  • Open the Settings blade for the vault, choose Access policies, then Add new.

  • In the Add access policy blade, choose Select principal and select the service principal for your client account.

  • In the Add access policy blade, choose Secret permissions and ensure that Get and List are checked (ticked).

  • Choose OK to save the changes.

# Azure Key Vault
# Download Azure Key Vault secrets
- task: AzureKeyVault@1
  inputs:
    azureSubscription: 
    keyVaultName: 
    secretsFilter: '*'

Arguments

If the value fetched from the vault is a certificate (for example, a PFX file), the task variable will contain the contents of the PFX in string format. You can use the following PowerShell code to retrieve the PFX file from the task variable:

$kvSecretBytes = [System.Convert]::FromBase64String($(PfxSecret))
$certCollection = New-Object System.Security.Cryptography.X509Certificates.X509Certificate2Collection
$certCollection.Import($kvSecretBytes,$null,[System.Security.Cryptography.X509Certificates.X509KeyStorageFlags]::Exportable)

If the certificate file will be stored locally on the machine, it is good practice to encrypt it with a password:

 #Get the file created
$password = 'your password'
$protectedCertificateBytes = $certCollection.Export([System.Security.Cryptography.X509Certificates.X509ContentType]::Pkcs12, $password)
$pfxPath = [Environment]::GetFolderPath("Desktop") + "\MyCert.pfx"
[System.IO.File]::WriteAllBytes($pfxPath, $protectedCertificateBytes)

For more details, see Get started with Azure Key Vault certificates.

Contact Information

Contact RM_Customer_Queries@microsoft.com if you discover issues using the task, to share feedback about the task, or to suggest new features that you would like to see.

Open source

This task is open source on GitHub. Feedback and contributions are welcome.

Q & A

Do I need an agent?

You need at least one agent to run your build or release. Get an agent for Linux, macOS, or Windows.

I'm having problems. How can I troubleshoot them?

See Troubleshoot Build and Release.

I can't select a default agent pool and I can't queue my build or release. How do I fix this?

See Agent pools.