# Buildkite elastic-ci stack throws 401 error when using aws secretsmanager
**URL:** https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923
**Category:** Elastic CI Stack for AWS
**Created:** [May 18, 2023, 5:09am UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923 "2023-05-18T05:09:01Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@surajthakur](https://forum.buildkite.community/u/surajthakur)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2023, 5:09am UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923/1 "2023-05-18T05:09:02Z")
Hi Team,
I am receiving error when I use aws secretsmanager to store the buildkite token.
I have mentioned my notes in this git issues [Improve error handling for HTTP 401 Unauthorized responses from Buildkite · Issue #58 · buildkite/buildkite-agent-scaler · GitHub](https://github.com/buildkite/buildkite-agent-scaler/issues/58#issuecomment-1552376262)
Any possible ideas why would I be getting the error 401.
It worked fine, if I set the token as the Parameter = BuildkiteAgentToken
Thanks
Suraj
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### Author:  [@lizette](https://forum.buildkite.community/u/lizette)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2023, 10:19am UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923/2 "2023-05-18T10:19:37Z")
Hi @surajthakur ,
This error is usually returned when the secret value is stored as key/value format. Can you confirm if you have provided the secret value as a plain text and not in this format {“\
### Author:  [@surajthakur](https://forum.buildkite.community/u/surajthakur)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2023, 12:10pm UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923/3 "2023-05-18T12:10:42Z")
Hi @lizette
Thanks for response.
I did use key/value pair. I will try using the plain text and check. It wasn’t explicitly mentioned in the docs, so got confused.
- Suraj
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### Author:  [@surajthakur](https://forum.buildkite.community/u/surajthakur)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2023, 5:02am UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923/4 "2023-05-19T05:02:48Z")
Hi Team,
Thanks for the solution. It worked fine.
Regards,
Suraj
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### Author:  [@paula](https://forum.buildkite.community/u/paula)
#### Post date: [August 29, 2023, 5:39am UTC](https://forum.buildkite.community/t/buildkite-elastic-ci-stack-throws-401-error-when-using-aws-secretsmanager/2923/5 "2023-08-29T05:39:30Z")