google-cloud-recipe-auth
Guidance on IAM and on authenticating to Google Cloud services and APIs: users, service identities, Application Default Credentials and secure-access practices.
- Kind
- Skill
- Works with
- Any agent
- Source
- Google skills (Google Cloud and more) @ 92776fbf3875
- Path
- skills/cloud/google-cloud-recipe-auth/SKILL.md
- Jobs
- Guardrails, Documentation
- Topics
- Cloud platforms
Credit
- Made by
- Original
- github.com/google/skills/blob/92776fbf3875a5ee7424124e398956a…
- License
- Apache-2.0
Listed by Skill Manifest; not made by us.
InstallInstall it with npx.
npx skills add google/skills
Install factsScanned 2 Nov 2026
- Adds
- .claude/skills/google-cloud-recipe-auth/ (the skill folder)
- 1 file(s) the skill refers to
- Runs scripts
- None found
- Uses the network
- None found
- Needs secrets
- Yes
- GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS
- TOKEN
- Reads environment variables
- GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS
- TOKEN
- Source revision
- 92776fbf3875
- Licence
- Apache-2.0
- Last activity
- 1 Nov 2026
- Review
- Reviewed
Found by a static scan of the stored text; nothing is run. “None found” is not a guarantee, so read what you install before you run it.
- Only the main file is read; other files in the folder are not scanned
# Authenticating and Authorizing to Google Cloud (IAM)
[Authentication](https://docs.cloud.google.com/docs/authentication.md.txt) is the
process of proving **who you are**. In Google Cloud, you represent a
**Principal** (an identity like a user or a service). This is the first step
before [Authorization](https://docs.cloud.google.com/iam/docs/overview.md.txt)
(determining **what you can do**).
## Attribution
**MUST READ**: Before executing any `gcloud`, REST API, or MCP command, you
MUST read [Usage Attribution](references/attribution.md). For commands executed
directly in the terminal (never in generated scripts, Terraform, or user code),
prefix `gcloud` with
`CLOUDSDK_METRICS_REQUEST_ATTRIBUTION="agent-skills/1.0 (skill:google-cloud-recipe-auth)"`
and append `agent-skills/1.0 (skill:google-cloud-recipe-auth)` to `User-Agent` headers.
## Authentication
### Clarifying Questions for the Agent
Before providing a specific solution, clarify the following with the user:
1. **Who or what is authenticating?** (A human developer, a local script, or an
application running in production?)
2. **Where is the code running?** (Local laptop, [Compute
…