API keys and credentials rotated
on a schedule, not after a scare
Most API keys and database credentials get created once, at launch, and never rotated again until a breach scare forces an emergency scramble to find every place they are used. We build an agent that rotates secrets on a schedule, updates every system that depends on them, and confirms nothing broke before calling the rotation complete.
The process today
A secret, an API key, a database password, a webhook signing token, gets created once, usually during initial setup, and then lives unchanged for years. Nobody rotates it because rotating it safely means finding every place it is used first, and that inventory does not exist anywhere centrally; it is scattered across environment files, infrastructure-as-code, a secrets manager if you use one, and sometimes a config file someone hardcoded years ago and forgot about.
The second cost is that when rotation does happen, it is usually reactive: a credential appears in a leaked log, a departing contractor had access to it, a security scanner flags it as exposed in a public repository, and now it needs to change immediately, under pressure, with incomplete knowledge of everywhere it is used. That is exactly the situation most likely to cause an outage, because something gets missed in the scramble.
The third is that secrets without a rotation schedule accumulate risk silently: the longer a credential has been unchanged, the more systems and people have been exposed to it over time, and the harder it becomes to even reason about who might still have a copy of it somewhere.
What the agent does
The agent builds a full inventory of every secret in use across your stack, API keys, database and cache credentials, webhook signing secrets, internal service tokens, by scanning your codebase, environment configuration and infrastructure-as-code for every reference, not just whatever is already registered in a secrets manager. Each secret gets a rotation schedule based on its sensitivity, agreed with your team, a payment provider key rotating more often than an internal service token used only between two low-risk internal services.
When a rotation is due, the agent generates the new secret, updates every known consumer it identified during the inventory step, and runs a health check confirming the new secret actually works in every place it was updated, before revoking the old one. The old secret stays valid through a short overlap window specifically so a rotation never causes a hard outage from a timing mismatch between systems. Anything past its scheduled rotation window gets flagged immediately rather than silently skipped. Typical integrations: AWS Secrets Manager, HashiCorp Vault, your cloud provider’s native secret store, or environment variables managed through your deploy pipeline, with alerts to Slack or Telegram.
What stays with humans
Approving the rotation schedule and sensitivity tier for each secret is a decision your team makes, since it depends on judgment about what each credential actually protects. Rotating a secret shared with an external partner or customer, where the new value needs to be communicated outside your own systems, always involves a person coordinating that handoff; the agent prepares the new secret and confirms internal readiness, it does not contact a third party on your behalf. Revoking an old secret only happens after the health check confirms the new one works everywhere, and a person can always hold a rotation if something looks uncertain.
Guards
Every rotation is logged with exactly what changed, when, and the health check result that confirmed it was safe to revoke the old value. The overlap window and health check are mandatory steps that cannot be skipped, even under time pressure, specifically to prevent a rushed rotation from becoming an outage. A kill switch pauses scheduled rotations during a sensitive period, a major release or a known ongoing incident, without losing the inventory or the schedule itself.
Price and timeline
| Option | Price | What it covers | Timeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Single automation | from $800 | Core services, full secrets inventory, scheduled rotation with health checks | 1 to 2 weeks |
| Department package | from $2,100 | Secrets rotation plus access reviews and dependency vulnerability scanning | 2 to 4 weeks |
Running cost is usually $10 to $35 a month in model and secrets-manager API usage depending on secret count and rotation frequency.
Related
This pairs well with access reviews and offboarding since both reduce the same category of standing risk, and with dependency and vulnerability scanning as part of a broader security hygiene program. For the backup side of the same credentials your restore process depends on, see backup and restore drills. Full package details are on the AI agents service page and the automation-everything overview; for security practices on systems we run ourselves, see the secure infrastructure case study and the crypto wallet ten chains case study.
Still running on the same API keys you created at launch? Get in touch and we will map what needs rotating first.
Tired of doing this by hand? We can take the whole routine off your team, not just this step: Routine takeover, from $400 →
FAQ
How much does secrets rotation automation cost?
From $800 covering your core services and their secrets, live in 1 to 2 weeks. A larger footprint across multiple environments and third-party integrations usually runs $1,500 to $2,500.
What happens if a secret is used somewhere we forgot about?
The inventory step specifically looks for every reference to a secret across your codebase, environment configs and infrastructure-as-code, so forgotten consumers surface before rotation, not as a mid-rotation outage.
Can rotation actually break something mid-swap?
The overlap window is built specifically to prevent that: the old secret stays valid until the agent confirms the new one works everywhere it needs to, so there is no gap where neither credential is valid.
Which secrets does this cover?
API keys for third-party services, database and cache credentials, webhook signing secrets, and internal service-to-service tokens, wherever they are stored, in a secrets manager, environment variables, or infrastructure-as-code.
How often should secrets actually rotate?
It depends on sensitivity: a payment provider key might rotate quarterly, an internal service token monthly, a webhook secret after any suspected exposure. We set the schedule per secret with your team based on what it protects.