Deploy on Server

This is the practical path for most teams.

Minimal deployment

1. Copy .env.example to .env
2. Set required secrets
3. Run compose

cp .env.example .env
docker compose up -d

Required values

• BOTDETECTION_SIGNATURE_HASH_KEY
• BOTDETECTION_CLIENTSIDE_TOKEN_SECRET
• POSTGRES_PASSWORD (if using database services)

Full production template (server)

Use this as a baseline when you want response PII masking only for malicious traffic while keeping stealth throttling as default.

{
  "BotDetection": {
    "BotThreshold": 0.7,
    "DefaultActionPolicyName": "throttle-stealth",
    "BotTypeActionPolicies": {
      "Tool": "throttle-tools",
      "MaliciousBot": "mask-pii"
    },
    "ResponsePiiMasking": {
      "Enabled": true,
      "AutoApplyForHighConfidenceMalicious": true,
      "AutoApplyBotProbabilityThreshold": 0.9,
      "AutoApplyConfidenceThreshold": 0.75
    }
  }
}

Equivalent .env overrides for the website container/process:

BOTDETECTION_ACTION_POLICY=throttle-stealth
BOTDETECTION_RESPONSE_PII_MASKING_ENABLED=true
BOTDETECTION_RESPONSE_PII_MASKING_AUTO_APPLY=true
BOTDETECTION_RESPONSE_PII_MASKING_AUTO_APPLY_BOT_THRESHOLD=0.9
BOTDETECTION_RESPONSE_PII_MASKING_AUTO_APPLY_CONFIDENCE_THRESHOLD=0.75

Verify deployment

docker compose ps
docker compose logs --tail 100
curl http://localhost/health
curl http://localhost/bot-detection/health

Recommended rollout

1. Deploy in detect-only mode
2. Observe for at least 24 hours
3. Tune thresholds and policies
4. Enable stronger actions gradually

Production hardening checklist

• Configure and rotate detection secrets
• Restrict dashboard access (/_stylobot) by policy/network
• Send logs/metrics to your observability platform
• Backup persistence stores where used
• Define incident response for false-positive spikes

Change-management pattern

1. Create baseline metrics (bot %, challenge rate, block rate, false positives).
2. Adjust one policy dimension at a time.
3. Validate on a fixed time window before next change.
4. Promote configuration by environment.