What are docker secrets and why is it necessary

Question

I recently came across this term called "docker secrets". What does this mean?

Answer 1

In terms of Docker Swarm services, a secret is a blob of data, such as a password, SSH private key, SSL certificate, or another piece of data that should not be transmitted over a network or stored unencrypted in a Dockerfile or in your application’s source code.

In Docker 1.13 and higher, you can use "Docker secrets" to centrally manage this data and securely transmit it to only those containers that need access to it. Secrets are encrypted during transit and at rest in a Docker swarm. A given secret is only accessible to those services which have been granted explicit access to it, and only while those service tasks are running.

You can use secrets to manage any sensitive data which a container needs at runtime but you don’t want to store in the image or in source control, such as:

• Usernames and passwords

• TLS certificates and keys

• SSH keys

• Other important data such as the name of a database or internal server

• Generic strings or binary content (up to 500 kb in size).
  
  Another use case for using secrets is to provide a layer of abstraction between the container and a set of credentials.You can also use secrets to manage non-sensitive data, such as configuration files.