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How sensitive are the app key and app secret?

How sensitive are the app key and app secret?

rstokes
New member | Level 2

It's all in the title really, what can someone achieve with my app key and app secret? The api needs to be authenticated against a user to access data. What are possible bad outcomes of a compromised app secret and key?

 

Thanks!

1 Reply 1

Greg-DB
Dropbox Staff

The app key and secret identify your app, and are used during the OAuth app authorization flow. They do not themselves offer access to any user data.

 

A leaked app key/secret pair would allow someone to:
- impersonate your app (e.g., initiate the OAuth app authorization flow for your app). The potential here is limited though because they would not be able to register their own redirect URIs for your app.
- send bogus but correctly signed webhook notifications (since Dropbox signs real webhooks notificaitons using the app secret).

 

A leaked app key/secret pair itself would not allow someone to access user data however, as that requires an actual access token.

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