Enabling secret scanning for your repository

You can configure how GitHub scans your repositories for leaked secrets and generates alerts.

Who can use this feature?

Secret scanning is available for the following repositories:

  • Public repositories (for free)
  • Private and internal repositories in organizations using GitHub Enterprise Cloud with GitHub Advanced Security enabled

In this article

About enabling secret scanning alerts for users

Secret scanning alerts for users can be enabled on any free public repository that you own.

If you're an organization owner, you can enable secret scanning for multiple repositories at a time using security configurations. For more information, see About enabling security features at scale.

Enabling secret scanning alerts for users

  1. On GitHub, navigate to the main page of the repository.

  2. Under your repository name, click Settings. If you cannot see the "Settings" tab, select the dropdown menu, then click Settings.

    Screenshot of a repository header showing the tabs. The "Settings" tab is highlighted by a dark orange outline.

  3. In the "Security" section of the sidebar, click Code security.

  4. Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and click Enable for secret scanning. If you see a Disable button, it means that secret scanning is already enabled for the repository.

    Screenshot of the "Secret scanning" section of the "Code security" page, with the "Enable" button highlighted in a dark orange outline.

A repository administrator can choose to disable secret scanning for a repository at any time. For more information, see Managing security and analysis settings for your repository.

Next steps