Open-source guardrail

Printing an access token into the terminal

AgentTrail Guard lets this run by default, and writes the match to its local decision log so you can see how often it happens.

Default action
Warn
Severity
Medium severity
Library version
0.2.1Sep 29, 2026

What it catches, and what it misses

Written into the rule itself, next to what it matches, so you can judge it before you trust it.

Surfaces a command that prints a live credential — gh auth token, npm token list, an echo of a token-shaped variable, a docker login with the password on the command line, or a .netrc dump. Non-blocking, because seeing your own token is sometimes exactly what you need. The status siblings are deliberately NOT matched (gh auth status, npm whoami). It cannot tell whether the output is redirected, and it does NOT match a variable whose name does not contain token, secret, key or password. Global flags between npm/docker and the subcommand are tolerated (npm --silent token list, docker --context <name> login …), and an absolute tool path still matches; gh has no global flag before its subcommand, and a flag that itself runs a program is not read. A quoted MENTION is not a use: a search, a git commit -m message, an echo or a curl --data body that only names this command is left alone. That holds only while every shell metacharacter stays inside the quotes, so git commit -m "x" && … is still caught; and the carrier must be the first word, so sudo grep … is not exempt. echo is NOT one of those carriers here, because this rule's own trigger IS an echo: printing a quoted $TOKEN still warns.

Tested on every build

The rule must match every command on the left and none on the right, or the library does not build. Catching the real thing is easy; staying quiet on the near-miss is the hard part.

Catches (6)

  • gh auth token
  • echo $GITHUB_TOKEN
  • npm token list
  • cat ~/.netrc
  • npm --silent token list
  • docker --context prod login -p secret registry.example.com

Stays quiet on (7)

  • git commit -m "docs: explain gh auth token"
  • grep -rn "gh auth token" docs/
  • curl --data "we ran gh auth token" https://api.example.com/comments
  • gh auth status
  • npm whoami
  • echo $NODE_ENV
  • gh pr list --limit 20

What "warn" means in each app

The guard runs as a hook in each app, and each app gives a hook different powers. Here is what this rule's default action does in each one.

Claude Code
The call runs, and the match is written to the local decision log.
Cursor
The call runs, and Cursor shows nothing. The match is still written to the decision log.
Codex CLI
The call runs. Codex's terminal UI shows a hook line (a codex exec run shows nothing), and the match is written to the decision log.

Each app hands the guard a different set of calls: in a Cursor sandbox run mode, for one, some terminal commands run without reaching the guard at all. Read the notes for Cursor and for Codex CLI before you rely on a rule there.

Change what it does in one command

Turn it off, change its action, or silence it on one command shape. The narrow one is allow: the rule keeps catching everything else.

agenttrail-guard
$agenttrail-guard guardrails show se.token-print# everything about it
$agenttrail-guard guardrails set-action se.token-print ask# block, ask or warn
$agenttrail-guard guardrails allow se.token-print '<pattern>'# silence one shape
$agenttrail-guard guardrails disable se.token-print# turn it off

Put these guardrails in front of your agent.

AgentTrail Guard is free and open source. It checks every command and file change against the whole library before your agent runs it, on your machine, with no account.

bash
$npm i -g @agenttrail/guard
Read the source on GitHub