Deploying Honeytokens and Canarytokens Agent Skill

Plant canarytokens and honey credentials and alert on breach.

Context cost
7.3k tokensestimated from the bundle, loaded when it triggers
Bundle
5 files · 35.9 kB1 script among them — read before you run
Licence
Apache-2.0the author’s own terms
Last change
—v1.0
Servers it uses
Noneruns standalone

What it does

Plant canarytokens and honey credentials and alert on breach.

What this skill changes about the agent has not been set out here as a list. Its SKILL.md, shown below, says it in the author’s own words.

securitytesting

The skill itself

A skill is instructions the model reads, so you can see what you are getting: below is the start of its SKILL.md. The front matter loads with every session, the body loads when the skill triggers, and the whole file comes with the install.

SKILL.md12.7 kB · preview
--- name: deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens domain: cybersecurity subdomain: deception-technology tags: - deception-technology - canarytokens - honeytokens - breach-detection - threat-detection - d3fend - decoy-credentials - intrusion-detection version: '1.0' author: mahipal license: Apache-2.0 nist_csf: - DE.CM-01 mitre_attack: - T1556 ---
23# Deploying Honeytokens and Canarytokens
24
25> **Authorized Use Only:** Deception assets described here are defensive controls deployed inside your own environment. Deploying tokens, decoy credentials, or honeypots on infrastructure you do not own or administer, or using them to entrap third parties, may violate computer-misuse and privacy law. Deploy only on assets you own or are explicitly authorized to instrument, and route all alert data through approved monitoring channels.
26
27## Overview
28
29Honeytokens (a.k.a. canarytokens) are decoy artifacts — credentials, files, URLs, API keys, DNS names, database connection strings, documents — that have no legitimate operational use. Because no authorized user or process should ever touch them, **any** interaction is a high-fidelity signal of an intrusion, insider misuse, or reconnaissance. Unlike signature- or anomaly-based detection, honeytokens generate near-zero false positives: the alert *is* the compromise.
30
31Thinkst's open-source **Canarytokens** project (https://canarytokens.org and the self-hostable thinkst/canarytokens-docker) generates dozens of token types that "phone home" when triggered: an HTTP/web-bug URL that fires on GET, an AWS API key that fires when used against AWS, an MS Word/PDF document that fires on open, a DNS token that fires on resolution, a Slack API token, a Kubernetes kubeconfig, an Azure login certificate, a log4shell payload, and more. Each token is bound to a unique memo (so you know *where* it was planted) plus an alert channel (email and/or webhook).
32
33This skill maps to MITRE D3FEND's **Decoy File (D3-DF)**, **Decoy User Credential (D3-DUC)**, and **Honeytoken** techniques. From an ATT&CK perspective, a triggered honey credential most commonly evidences adversary attempts to abuse or modify authentication material (**T1556 – Modify Authentication Process** and related credential-access activity), giving the SOC an early, unambiguous tripwire deep inside the kill chain — typically after initial access but before lateral movement completes.
34
35## When to Use
36
37- When you need high-fidelity intrusion detection in segments where traditional telemetry is sparse (file shares, password vaults, code repos, cloud accounts).
38- When validating that an attacker who reaches a "crown-jewel" host or document store is detected, not just blocked at the perimeter.
39- When seeding decoy credentials into LSASS-reachable memory, browser stores, .aws/credentials, or password managers to catch credential dumping and reuse.
40- When instrumenting documents, repos, or wikis to catch data theft and ransomware staging.
41- When building a MITRE D3FEND-aligned deception layer as part of a defense-in-depth or zero-trust program.
42
This is a preview of SKILL.md. Download or install the skill to get the whole thing.
In the file
SKILL.md1,729 words
Files5
LicenceApache-2.0
Why you can read it

Nothing in a skill executes. The client loads the text and the model follows it, so a skill can be audited the way a runbook is — by reading it.

What it costs in context

Skills are not billed by the call. They are paid for in context: every token the instructions occupy is a token your code, your diff and your conversation cannot use. Here is what this one takes and when it takes it.

≈110
always loaded
The name and description, so the model knows the skill exists and when to reach for it.
7,165
on trigger
The instruction body and 4 supporting files, read only when the skill fires.
3.6%
of a 200k window
Ten skills this size would take about 36% of the window before you open a file.
050k100k150k200k context window

7.3k tokens, estimated from the bundle at four bytes to the token, held for the rest of the session once it triggers. Heavy. Teams tend to install this one per project rather than globally, and load it only when the job comes up.

Servers bill, skills cost

A server charges by the month. A skill charges once per session, in context, and then keeps charging it for as long as the session lives.

Before and after

The same question, put to the same model twice: once as it comes, and once with these instructions loaded.

No worked example has been published for this skill yet.

The procedure it runs

The procedure has not been set out here step by step. It is in the body of its SKILL.md: the start of it is shown above, and the whole file comes with the install.

Prose, not code

These steps are written for a model to follow, not executed by a runtime. It can still be told to skip one, and it will say so when it does.

Servers it uses

None. This skill calls no MCP servers at all.

Everything it needs is in the instructions, so it works in a project with nothing connected — the model reads the file and changes how it works with what it can already reach.

Its SKILL.md does not declare which tools it asks the agent for, so what it touches is whatever the instructions themselves ask for — read them before you install it.

What it asks for
Writes filesnot declared
Network accessnot declared

This SKILL.md carries no allowed-tools line, so neither is declared. A skill grants no permissions of its own — it can only ask for tools your client already has.

What it will not do

Every skill is narrow, and the useful ones say where they stop. These are the jobs this one is the wrong tool for.

What this skill is not for has not been published here. Nothing is implied by that: it is a section the author has not filled in.

What is in the bundle

5 files, 35.9 kB on disk. Mostly text — the instructions the model reads — with 1 script in it that your client would run only if the instructions tell it to.

  • SKILL.md12.7 kB
  • LICENSE11.3 kB
  • references/api-reference.md3.6 kB
  • references/standards.md1.5 kB
  • scripts/agent.py6.8 kB
What is not in it

A skill installs nothing and depends on nothing: it is a folder your client reads. This one carries 1 script beside the text, so the bundle is 5 files you can review in full before installing. The Apache-2.0 licence covers the templates and examples as well as the instructions.

Install

Installing copies the bundle into your project. Nothing runs at install time — the files sit on disk until the model reads them.

# Deploying Honeytokens and Canarytokens · 7.3k tokens when loaded · macOS, Linux mkdir -p .claude/skills && t=$(mktemp -d) && curl -fsSL -o "$t/bundle.tar.gz" https://mcprush.com/api/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens/bundle.tar.gz && tar -xzf "$t/bundle.tar.gz" -C "$t" && [ -d "$t/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens" ] && { [ ! -e .claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens ] || { mv .claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens "$t/.previous" && echo "Previous copy moved to $t/.previous"; }; } && mv "$t/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens" .claude/skills/ && echo "Installed .claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens"
On Windows, or any OS with Node 20+
npx mcprush@latest skill add sueytame/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens

Windows PowerShell says 'running scripts is disabled on this system'? Run Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser RemoteSigned once, or type npx.cmd instead of npx (codex.cmd, gemini.cmd, grok.cmd likewise). PowerShell 7 needs neither. Writes to .claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens/ in the current project. For every project instead, run mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && t=$(mktemp -d) && curl -fsSL -o "$t/bundle.tar.gz" https://mcprush.com/api/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens/bundle.tar.gz && tar -xzf "$t/bundle.tar.gz" -C "$t" && [ -d "$t/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens" ] && { [ ! -e ~/.claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens ] || { mv ~/.claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens "$t/.previous" && echo "Previous copy moved to $t/.previous"; }; } && mv "$t/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens" ~/.claude/skills/ && echo "Installed ~/.claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens" (macOS, Linux) — or add --global to the npx line. The curl line replaces .claude/skills/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens/ only after the download succeeds, so files left there by another skill of the same name, or by an older release, do not mix in. A copy already there is moved aside, not deleted, and the line prints where.

Which clients pick it up on their own

A skill is a folder of text. Most of these read a skills folder and pick it up without being told; the rest take the same folder another way — an upload in the app, a parameter on an API call — and then choose it by its description just the same.

Claude Code.claude/skills/
Claude DesktopCustomize › Skills
ChatGPTSkills › Create › Upload
Cursor.cursor/skills/
VS Code.github/skills/
Codex CLI.agents/skills/
Gemini CLI.gemini/skills/
Grok Build.grok/skills/
Microsoft CopilotSkills › Upload a skill
PerplexityComputer › Skills › Upload a skill
DeepSeek Harness.dsh/skills/
Zed.agents/skills/
Devin Desktop.devin/skills/
Windsurf (legacy).windsurf/skills/
OpenAI Agents SDKInstructions or sandbox Skills
HTTP / APIa request parameter
This release
Version1.0
Publishedno release date on file
PriceFree
Referencesueytame/deploying-honeytokens-and-canarytokens

Versions

v1.0 is what is on the shelf; no release here carries a date. Instructions change more often than APIs do — a skill can be rewritten entirely without anything it depends on moving.

v1.0
  • No earlier releases have been published to the marketplace.
Pinning

The install command always fetches the release that is current the day you run it — v1.0 today — and cannot ask for an earlier one. The copy on your disk does not change until you run it again.

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