skills/redis-security/SKILL.md
Redis security guidance covering authentication (requirepass and ACL users), TLS, ACL-based least-privilege access control, restricting network exposure via bind and protected-mode, firewall rules, and disabling dangerous commands. Use when deploying Redis to production, defining ACL users for an application, configuring TLS connections, locking down a Redis instance behind a firewall, or auditing a Redis deployment for security hardening.
npx skillsauth add redis/agent-skills redis-securityInstall this skill globally with one command. Works with Claude Code, Cursor, and Windsurf.
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Production hardening for Redis: authentication, ACL-based access control, and network exposure. Cover all three together — any one of them on its own leaves an exploitable gap.
Never run a production Redis without a password. Pair authentication with TLS so credentials and data aren't sent in clear text.
# redis.conf
requirepass your-strong-password
tls-port 6380
tls-cert-file /path/to/redis.crt
tls-key-file /path/to/redis.key
r = redis.Redis(
host="localhost",
port=6380,
password="your-strong-password",
ssl=True,
ssl_cert_reqs="required",
)
If you can use ACL users (next section) instead of the single requirepass, do — requirepass is effectively the legacy "default user" shortcut.
See references/auth.md.
The default user with a shared password is fine for development. For production, give each application a dedicated ACL user with only the commands and key patterns it actually needs.
# Cache-only reader
ACL SETUSER app_readonly on >password ~cache:* +get +mget +scan
# Writer that can't run dangerous ops
ACL SETUSER app_writer on >password ~* +@all -@dangerous
# Admin (use sparingly, never for application traffic)
ACL SETUSER admin on >strong-password ~* +@all
Useful command categories:
| Category | What it covers |
|---|---|
| @read | Read commands (GET, MGET, HGET, ...) |
| @write | Write commands (SET, DEL, XADD, ...) |
| @dangerous | FLUSHALL, DEBUG, KEYS, etc. |
| @admin | Administrative commands |
If app credentials leak, a tight ACL bounds the blast radius — the attacker can't FLUSHALL your DB just because they grabbed a cache reader's password.
See references/acls.md.
The most common Redis breach is a public-internet Redis with no auth. Avoid that with three layers:
# redis.conf — bind to specific interfaces, keep protected-mode on
bind 127.0.0.1 192.168.1.100
protected-mode yes
# Firewall — allow only application subnets
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 6379 -s 192.168.1.0/24 -j ACCEPT
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 6379 -j DROP
Anti-pattern: bind 0.0.0.0 + protected-mode no — exposes Redis to the whole network without protection.
Optional but recommended: rename or disable destructive commands so a compromised client can't trash the DB:
rename-command FLUSHALL ""
rename-command DEBUG ""
rename-command CONFIG ""
See references/network.md.
development
Redis vector search guidance covering HNSW vs FLAT algorithm choice, vector index configuration (dims, distance metric, datatype), filtered hybrid search combining vector similarity with TAG or NUMERIC filters, and the RAG retrieval pattern with RedisVL. Use when defining a VECTOR field in FT.CREATE, integrating embeddings (OpenAI, Cohere, sentence-transformers), tuning HNSW parameters (M, EF_CONSTRUCTION, EF_RUNTIME), building a retrieval-augmented generation pipeline, or filtering vector results by attribute.
development
Redis LangCache guidance for semantic caching of LLM responses on Redis Cloud — calling search/set via the SDK or REST API, tuning the similarity threshold, separating caches per task type, and filtering with custom attributes. Use when caching LLM completions or RAG answers to cut API cost and latency, building a cache-aside layer in front of OpenAI / Anthropic / etc., tuning hit rate vs precision, or splitting one app's LLM workloads into multiple LangCache caches.
testing
Redis Query Engine (RQE) guidance covering FT.CREATE schema design, field type selection (TEXT, TAG, NUMERIC, GEO, GEOSHAPE, VECTOR), DIALECT 2 query syntax, efficient FT.SEARCH and FT.AGGREGATE queries, zero-downtime index updates via aliases, and the SKIPINITIALSCAN option. Use when defining a search index on Hash or JSON documents, picking between TEXT and TAG for filtering, writing FT.SEARCH queries with filters and SORTBY, managing or swapping indexes in production, or troubleshooting slow searches with FT.PROFILE.
tools
Redis observability guidance — which metrics to monitor (memory, connections, hit ratio, ops/sec, rejected connections), which built-in commands to reach for during incident triage (SLOWLOG, INFO, MEMORY DOCTOR, CLIENT LIST, FT.PROFILE), and when to use the Redis Insight GUI. Use when setting up monitoring or alerts for a Redis instance, diagnosing a performance regression, profiling a slow FT.SEARCH query, or wiring Redis metrics into Prometheus, Datadog, or similar.