Azure Key Vault Administration client library for Python

Note: The Administration library only works with Managed HSM – functions targeting a Key Vault will fail.

Azure Key Vault helps solve the following problems:

• Vault administration (this library) - role-based access control (RBAC), and vault-level backup and restore options
• Cryptographic key management (azure-keyvault-keys) - create, store, and control access to the keys used to encrypt your data
• Secrets management (azure-keyvault-secrets) - securely store and control access to tokens, passwords, certificates, API keys, and other secrets
• Certificate management (azure-keyvault-certificates) - create, manage, and deploy public and private SSL/TLS certificates

Source code | Package (PyPI) | API reference documentation | Product documentation | Samples

Disclaimer

Azure SDK Python packages support for Python 2.7 has ended 01 January 2022. For more information and questions, please refer to https://github.com/Azure/azure-sdk-for-python/issues/20691.

Getting started

Install packages

Install azure-keyvault-administration and azure-identity with pip:

pip install azure-keyvault-administration azure-identity

azure-identity is used for Azure Active Directory authentication as demonstrated below.

Prerequisites

• An Azure subscription
• Python 3.6 or later
• An existing Key Vault Managed HSM. If you need to create one, you can do so using the Azure CLI by following the steps in this document.

Authenticate the client

In order to interact with the Azure Key Vault service, you will need an instance of either a KeyVaultAccessControlClient or KeyVaultBackupClient, as well as a vault url (which you may see as "DNS Name" in the Azure Portal) and a credential object. This document demonstrates using a DefaultAzureCredential, which is appropriate for most scenarios, including local development and production environments. We recommend using a managed identity for authentication in production environments.

See azure-identity documentation for more information about other methods of authentication and their corresponding credential types.

Create a KeyVaultAccessControlClient

After configuring your environment for the DefaultAzureCredential to use a suitable method of authentication, you can do the following to create an access control client (replacing the value of vault_url with your Managed HSM's URL):

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultAccessControlClient

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

NOTE: For an asynchronous client, import azure.keyvault.administration.aio's KeyVaultAccessControlClient instead.

Create a KeyVaultBackupClient

After configuring your environment for the DefaultAzureCredential to use a suitable method of authentication, you can do the following to create a backup client (replacing the value of vault_url with your Managed HSM's URL):

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultBackupClient

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultBackupClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

NOTE: For an asynchronous client, import azure.keyvault.administration.aio's KeyVaultBackupClient instead.

Key concepts

Role definition

A role definition defines the operations that can be performed, such as read, write, and delete. It can also define the operations that are excluded from allowed operations.

A role definition is specified as part of a role assignment.

Role assignment

A role assignment is the association of a role definition to a service principal. They can be created, listed, fetched individually, and deleted.

KeyVaultAccessControlClient

A KeyVaultAccessControlClient manages role definitions and role assignments.

KeyVaultBackupClient

A KeyVaultBackupClient performs full key backups, full key restores, and selective key restores.

Examples

This section contains code snippets covering common tasks:

• Access control
  • List all role definitions
  • Set, get, and delete a role definition
  • List all role assignments
  • Create, get, and delete a role assignment
• Backup and restore
  • Perform a full key backup
  • Perform a full key restore

List all role definitions

List the role definitions available for assignment.

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultAccessControlClient, KeyVaultRoleScope

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

# this will list all role definitions available for assignment
role_definitions = client.list_role_definitions(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL)

for definition in role_definitions:
    print(definition.id)
    print(definition.role_name)
    print(definition.description)

Set, get, and delete a role definition

set_role_definition can be used to either create a custom role definition or update an existing definition with the specified name.

import uuid
from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import (
    KeyVaultAccessControlClient,
    KeyVaultDataAction,
    KeyVaultPermission,
    KeyVaultRoleScope
)

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

# create a custom role definition
permissions = [KeyVaultPermission(allowed_data_actions=[KeyVaultDataAction.READ_HSM_KEY])]
created_definition = client.set_role_definition(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, permissions=permissions)

# update the custom role definition
permissions = [
    KeyVaultPermission(allowed_data_actions=[], denied_data_actions=[KeyVaultDataAction.READ_HSM_KEY])
]
updated_definition = client.set_role_definition(
    KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, permissions=permissions, role_name=created_definition.name
)

# get the custom role definition
definition = client.get_role_definition(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, role_name=definition_name)

# delete the custom role definition
deleted_definition = client.delete_role_definition(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, role_name=definition_name)

List all role assignments

Before creating a new role assignment in the next snippet, list all of the current role assignments:

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultAccessControlClient, KeyVaultRoleScope

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

# this will list all role assignments
role_assignments = client.list_role_assignments(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL)

for assignment in role_assignments:
    print(assignment.name)
    print(assignment.principal_id)
    print(assignment.role_definition_id)

Create, get, and delete a role assignment

Assign a role to a service principal. This will require a role definition ID and service principal object ID. You can use an ID from the retrieved list of role definitions for the former, and an assignment's principal_id from the list retrieved in the above snippet for the latter.

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultAccessControlClient, KeyVaultRoleScope

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()

client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(
    vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/",
    credential=credential
)

# Replace <role-definition-id> with the id of a definition from the fetched list from an earlier example
role_definition_id = "<role-definition-id>"
# Replace <service-principal-object-id> with the principal_id of an assignment returned from the previous example
principal_id = "<service-principal-object-id>"

# first, let's create the role assignment
role_assignment = client.create_role_assignment(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, role_definition_id, principal_id)
print(role_assignment.name)
print(role_assignment.principal_id)
print(role_assignment.role_definition_id)

# now, we get it
role_assignment = client.get_role_assignment(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, role_assignment.name)
print(role_assignment.name)
print(role_assignment.principal_id)
print(role_assignment.role_definition_id)

# finally, we delete this role assignment
role_assignment = client.delete_role_assignment(KeyVaultRoleScope.GLOBAL, role_assignment.name)
print(role_assignment.name)
print(role_assignment.principal_id)
print(role_assignment.role_definition_id)

Perform a full key backup

Back up your entire collection of keys. The backing store for full key backups is a blob storage container using Shared Access Signature authentication.

For more details on creating a SAS token using the BlobServiceClient, see the sample here. Alternatively, it is possible to generate a SAS token in Storage Explorer

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultBackupClient

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()
client = KeyVaultBackupClient(vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/", credential=credential)

# blob storage container URL, for example https://<account name>.blob.core.windows.net/backup
blob_storage_url = "<your-blob-storage-url>"
sas_token = "<your-sas-token>"  # replace with a sas token to your storage account

# Backup is a long-running operation. The client returns a poller object whose result() method
# blocks until the backup is complete, then returns an object representing the backup operation.
backup_poller = client.begin_backup(blob_storage_url, sas_token)
backup_operation = backup_poller.result()

# this is the Azure Storage Blob URL of the backup
print(backup_operation.folder_url)

Perform a full key restore

Restore your entire collection of keys from a backup. The data source for a full key restore is a storage blob accessed using Shared Access Signature authentication. You will also need the azure_storage_blob_container_uri from the above snippet.

For more details on creating a SAS token using the BlobServiceClient, see the sample here. Alternatively, it is possible to generate a SAS token in Storage Explorer

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultBackupClient

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()
client = KeyVaultBackupClient(vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/", credential=credential)

sas_token = "<your-sas-token>"  # replace with a sas token to your storage account

# URL to a storage blob, for example https://<account name>.blob.core.windows.net/backup/mhsm-account-2020090117323313
blob_url = "<your-blob-url>"

# Restore is a long-running operation. The client returns a poller object whose wait() method
# blocks until the restore is complete.
restore_poller = client.begin_restore(blob_url, sas_token)
restore_poller.wait()

Troubleshooting

See the azure-keyvault-administration troubleshooting guide for details on how to diagnose various failure scenarios.

General

Key Vault clients raise exceptions defined in azure-core. For example, if you try to get a role assignment that doesn't exist, KeyVaultAccessControlClient raises ResourceNotFoundError:

from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential
from azure.keyvault.administration import KeyVaultAccessControlClient
from azure.core.exceptions import ResourceNotFoundError

credential = DefaultAzureCredential()
client = KeyVaultAccessControlClient(vault_url="https://my-managed-hsm-name.managedhsm.azure.net/", credential=credential)

try:
    client.get_role_assignment("/", "which-does-not-exist")
except ResourceNotFoundError as e:
    print(e.message)

Clients from the Administration library can only be used to perform operations on a managed HSM, so attempting to do so on a Key Vault will raise an error.

Next steps

Several samples are available in the Azure SDK for Python GitHub repository. These samples provide example code for additional Key Vault scenarios:

Additional documentation

For more extensive documentation on Azure Key Vault, see the API reference documentation.

For more extensive documentation on Managed HSM, see the service documentation.

Contributing

This project welcomes contributions and suggestions. Most contributions require you to agree to a Contributor License Agreement (CLA) declaring that you have the right to, and actually do, grant us the rights to use your contribution. For details, visit https://cla.microsoft.com.

When you submit a pull request, a CLA-bot will automatically determine whether you need to provide a CLA and decorate the PR appropriately (e.g., label, comment). Simply follow the instructions provided by the bot. You will only need to do this once across all repos using our CLA.

This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct. For more information, see the Code of Conduct FAQ or contact opencode@microsoft.com with any additional questions or comments.

Release History

4.2.0 (2022-09-19)

Breaking Changes

• Clients verify the challenge resource matches the vault domain. This should affect few customers, who can provide verify_challenge_resource=False to client constructors to disable. See https://aka.ms/azsdk/blog/vault-uri for more information.

4.1.1 (2022-08-11)

Other Changes

• Documentation improvements (#25039)

4.1.0 (2022-03-28)

Features Added

• Key Vault API version 7.3 is now the default
• Added support for multi-tenant authentication when using azure-identity 1.8.0 or newer (#20698)

Other Changes

• (From 4.1.0b3) Python 2.7 is no longer supported. Please use Python version 3.6 or later.
• (From 4.1.0b3) Updated minimum azure-core version to 1.20.0
• (From 4.1.0b2) To support multi-tenant authentication, get_token calls during challenge authentication requests now pass in a tenant_id keyword argument (#20698). See https://aka.ms/azsdk/python/identity/tokencredential for more details on how to integrate this parameter if get_token is implemented by a custom credential.

4.1.0b3 (2022-02-08)

Other Changes

• Python 2.7 is no longer supported. Please use Python version 3.6 or later.
• Updated minimum azure-core version to 1.20.0
• (From 4.1.0b2) To support multi-tenant authentication, get_token calls during challenge authentication requests now pass in a tenant_id keyword argument (#20698)

4.1.0b2 (2021-11-11)

Features Added

• Added support for multi-tenant authentication when using azure-identity 1.7.1 or newer (#20698)

Other Changes

• Updated minimum azure-core version to 1.15.0

4.1.0b1 (2021-09-09)

Features Added

• Key Vault API version 7.3-preview is now the default

4.0.0 (2021-06-22)

Changed

• Key Vault API version 7.2 is now the default
• KeyVaultAccessControlClient.delete_role_assignment and .delete_role_definition no longer raise an error when the resource to be deleted is not found
• Raised minimum azure-core version to 1.11.0

Added

• KeyVaultAccessControlClient.set_role_definition accepts an optional assignable_scopes keyword-only argument

Breaking Changes

• KeyVaultAccessControlClient.delete_role_assignment and .delete_role_definition return None
• Changed parameter order in KeyVaultAccessControlClient.set_role_definition. permissions is now an optional keyword-only argument
• Renamed BackupOperation to KeyVaultBackupResult, and removed all but its folder_url property
• Removed RestoreOperation and SelectiveKeyRestoreOperation classes
• Removed KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_selective_restore. To restore a single key, pass the key's name to KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_restore:

  # before (4.0.0b3):
  client.begin_selective_restore(folder_url, sas_token, key_name)
  
  # after:
  client.begin_restore(folder_url, sas_token, key_name=key_name)
  

• Removed KeyVaultBackupClient.get_backup_status and .get_restore_status. Use the pollers returned by KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_backup and .begin_restore to check whether an operation has completed
• KeyVaultRoleAssignment's principal_id, role_definition_id, and scope are now properties of a properties property

  # before (4.0.0b3):
  print(KeyVaultRoleAssignment.scope)
  
  # after:
  print(KeyVaultRoleAssignment.properties.scope)
  

• Renamed KeyVaultPermission properties:
  • allowed_actions -> actions
  • denied_actions -> not_actions
  • allowed_data_actions -> data_actions
  • denied_data_actions -> denied_data_actions
• Renamed argument role_assignment_name to name in KeyVaultAccessControlClient.create_role_assignment, .delete_role_assignment, and .get_role_assignment
• Renamed argument role_definition_name to name in KeyVaultAccessControlClient.delete_role_definition and .get_role_definition
• Renamed argument role_scope to scope in KeyVaultAccessControlClient methods

4.0.0b3 (2021-02-09)

Added

• KeyVaultAccessControlClient supports managing custom role definitions

Breaking Changes

• Renamed KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_full_backup() to .begin_backup()
• Renamed KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_full_restore() to .begin_restore()
• Renamed BackupOperation.azure_storage_blob_container_uri to .folder_url
• Renamed id property of BackupOperation, RestoreOperation, and SelectiveKeyRestoreOperation to job_id
• Renamed blob_storage_uri parameters of KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_restore() and .begin_selective_restore() to folder_url
• Removed redundant folder_name parameter from KeyVaultBackupClient.begin_restore() and .begin_selective_restore() (the folder_url parameter contains the folder name)
• Renamed KeyVaultPermission attributes:
  • actions -> allowed_actions
  • data_actions -> allowed_data_actions
  • not_actions -> denied_actions
  • not_data_actions -> denied_data_actions
• Renamed KeyVaultRoleAssignment.assignment_id to .role_assignment_id
• Renamed KeyVaultRoleScope enum values:
  • global_value -> GLOBAL
  • keys_value -> KEYS

4.0.0b2 (2020-10-06)

Added

• KeyVaultBackupClient.get_backup_status and .get_restore_status enable checking the status of a pending operation by its job ID (#13718)

Breaking Changes

• The role_assignment_name parameter of KeyVaultAccessControlClient.create_role_assignment is now an optional keyword-only argument. When this argument isn't passed, the client will generate a name for the role assignment. (#13512)

4.0.0b1 (2020-09-08)

Added

• KeyVaultAccessControlClient performs role-based access control operations
• KeyVaultBackupClient performs full vault backup and full and selective restore operations