# Building Plugin - Secret inputs

**URL:** <https://answers.netlify.com/t/building-plugin-secret-inputs/14550>\
**Category:** Support\
**Tags:** building\
**Created:** [May 13, 2020, 1:06am UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/building-plugin-secret-inputs/14550 "2020-05-13T01:06:27Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![BrunoQuaresma](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/netlify/user_avatar/answers.netlify.com/brunoquaresma/32/1143_2.png) [@BrunoQuaresma](https://answers.netlify.com/u/BrunoQuaresma)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2020, 1:06am UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/building-plugin-secret-inputs/14550/1 "2020-05-13T01:06:27Z")

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Hello,

I’m developing a plugin to [Logre.IO](http://Logre.IO) to log the build info there and the plugin, has two inputs, box id and box secret, since the box secret is a sensitive information is there a way to use an environment variable or something else instead of plain text in the config file?

Thanks!

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**Author:** ![ehmicky](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/netlify/user_avatar/answers.netlify.com/ehmicky/32/4051_2.png) [@ehmicky](https://answers.netlify.com/u/ehmicky)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2020, 11:31am UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/building-plugin-secret-inputs/14550/2 "2020-05-13T11:31:38Z")

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Hi @BrunoQuaresma,

Looking forward to see this plugin!

Secret information cannot be in the `netlify.toml` indeed. However you can either:

- use an environment variable `process.env.MY_SECRET` inside the plugin. The user would need to add that environment variable in their Site settings
- if your application has a configuration file, ask the user to put it there, then read that configuration file inside the plugin.

That being said, I have opened the [following discussion](https://github.com/netlify/build/issues/1265) to evaluate our current solutions. Any feedback is welcome!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![BrunoQuaresma](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/netlify/user_avatar/answers.netlify.com/brunoquaresma/32/1143_2.png) [@BrunoQuaresma](https://answers.netlify.com/u/BrunoQuaresma)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2020, 1:47pm UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/building-plugin-secret-inputs/14550/3 "2020-05-13T13:47:43Z")

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Thank you @ehmicky. It was really helpful!