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MCP Clients

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MCP Clients

Overview

An MCP Client is a saved configuration for connecting out to an external Model Context Protocol server so your agents can call the tools it exposes. You manage clients from MCP Clients in the left navigation, then reference a client from an agent's MCP Client Call step.

Each client stores a name, the server's streamable‑HTTP URL, and how to authenticate. Connection details and secrets live on the client — agent steps only reference the client by id, so the same server can be reused across many agents and updated in one place.

When adding a client, the first step — Choose a server — lets you search a directory of well‑known MCP servers (grouped by category) and pick one; the next step opens a form tailored to your choice. Servers marked Managed connect with Seclai's own OAuth app (no setup — you just pick permissions); the rest pre‑fill the verified URL and you supply your own auth. A few entries are marked Setup guide — these vendors (e.g. Google Cloud) don't offer a single hosted endpoint but document how to stand one up; the card links to their setup docs instead. To connect a server that isn't in the catalog, choose Add a custom server and enter its URL and authentication yourself.

Preconfigured Servers

Seclai keeps a catalog of well‑known MCP servers so you don't have to track down endpoints and auth settings yourself. Browse them on the MCP Server Catalog — search by name or tool, preview the tools each server exposes, and add one to your account in a click. Managed servers connect with Seclai's own OAuth app (one click, no setup); OAuth/API key servers you authenticate with your own credentials; Setup guide entries link to a vendor's instructions for standing up their endpoint. The same catalog appears in the Choose a server step when you create a client.

Slack: User vs Bot

The catalog offers two managed Slack integrations. Pick based on attribution and whether you need search:

  • Slack (User) acts as the person who authorizes the connection. Messages post as that user (with a “Sent using Seclai” footer) and reads use their access. It's the only option that can search Slack — Slack's search API requires a user token. Choose it when you need search or want activity attributed to a specific person.
  • Slack (Bot) acts as the app/bot — clean attribution, no impersonation and no footer. It can post messages and read channels, history, users, and reactions, but it cannot search (bots have no search API). Choose it when you don't want agent activity to look like it came from a real person.

Both connect the same way (managed OAuth, one click) and live side by side on the MCP Clients page — you can add either or both.

Creating a Client

  1. Open MCP Clients and choose Add MCP Client.
  2. Give it a name and the server's URL. The URL must be https:// and publicly reachable.
  3. Choose an authentication method (below) and save.

Authentication

  • None — the server requires no credentials.
  • API key / bearer — Seclai sends an API key on every request. By default it is sent as an Authorization: Bearer <key> header; set a custom header name to send the raw key under a different header. The key is stored securely and is never shown again once saved — leave the field blank when editing to keep the existing key, or enter a new value to replace it.
  • OAuth — Seclai performs an OAuth authorization‑code flow with the server. Most hosted servers register automatically — just enter the server URL and click Connect with OAuth on the client's detail page to complete the interactive authorization in your browser. Once connected, Seclai stores and automatically refreshes the access token, so agent runs (which have no human present) can keep calling the server. Some servers do not support automatic (dynamic) client registration — GitHub's remote MCP server (https://api.githubcopilot.com/mcp/) is one example. For those you have three options, easiest first:
    • Managed provider — if a Provider dropdown offers the server (e.g. “GitHub (managed)”), pick it. Seclai connects with its own OAuth app, so there's nothing to register — just name the client, choose which permissions to request (a recommended set is pre‑selected), save, and Connect with OAuth. You confirm the same permissions on the provider's consent screen. Seclai's app credentials stay server‑side and are never shown. Changing the selected permissions later requires reconnecting.
    • API key / bearer — use bearer auth with a personal access token (GitHub accepts a PAT sent as an Authorization: Bearer … header).
    • Your own OAuth app — create an OAuth app on the server and enter its client ID (and secret, if any) under Advanced OAuth settings, then reconnect.

Changing the connected account

To connect a different account on the provider (e.g. a different Dropbox or GitHub login), it isn't enough to just Disconnect and reconnect in Seclai: the provider remembers that you already authorized Seclai for the account you're signed into, and will silently re-issue access to that same account — which is why reconnecting can complete without ever showing the provider's sign‑in screen. To switch accounts:

  1. On the client's Configuration tab, click Disconnect (this revokes and deletes Seclai's stored tokens for this client).
  2. In your browser, sign out of the provider — or, better, remove Seclai from the provider's connected/authorized apps (e.g. Dropbox → Settings → Connected apps, GitHub → Settings → Applications). This clears the remembered grant so the next authorization starts fresh.
  3. Sign into the account you want, then click Reconnect with OAuth. For a managed provider, Seclai always requests the provider's approval screen on reconnect, so you can review and authorize with the intended account. For a custom OAuth server the approval screen only appears if that server prompts for it — step 2 above is what guarantees a fresh sign‑in either way.

Browsing the Server's Tools

A client's detail page shows the Tools the server exposes. Click Refresh to connect with the configured authentication and fetch the latest catalog; Seclai stores it (with a "last updated" timestamp) so you can browse each tool's description and parameters — name, type, whether it's required, and allowed values — without reconnecting every time. Refreshing also confirms your credentials work. If a refresh fails, the previously fetched catalog is kept so the list never blanks out.

Using in Agents

There are two ways to call MCP tools from an agent:

Fixed call — the MCP Client Call step. Add an MCP Client Call step, select the client, and pick a tool (use Refresh tools to fetch the live list). Provide the tool's arguments as key/value pairs — each value supports string substitutions such as {{input}} or {{step.<id>.output}}. The tool's result becomes the step's output. See the MCP Client Call step reference for field details. Use this when you know exactly which tool to call.

Model-chosen calls — inside a Prompt Call step. A Prompt Call step has an MCP server tools selector (under Advanced options). Pick a client and enable the tools you want the model to be able to call; during the step the model decides if and when to invoke them and feeds the results back into its own reasoning. Use Add all when a client exposes a handful of tools, or select individually for larger servers. Up to 20 MCP tools can be enabled on a single prompt step (to keep the model's context manageable). Refresh a client's tools first so its catalog is available to choose from.

Pointing a Client at Seclai Itself

You can point an MCP client at Seclai's own MCP server so an agent can call Seclai management tools (for example to read alerts, run another agent, or triage governance evaluations). When a tool runs from inside an agent, a restricted set applies — a deliberate safeguard so that untrusted content flowing through a run can't drive the agent into destructive or data-exfiltrating actions:

  • Blocked from agents: deleting resources; changing governance settings, policies, or a policy's knowledge bases; rewriting an agent's definition; creating or repointing MCP clients; transferring resources between accounts or switching organizations; dismissing all model alerts or cancelling a pending human-in-the-loop request; and bulk data exports (export is a human data-portability feature, not an agent action).
  • Allowed: reading/listing, running agents, knowledge-base and source configuration, governance evaluation triage, and other ordinary operations.

If an agent tries a blocked tool it receives a clear "not available to agent-originated calls" error — that is expected, not a bug. Agents are also depth-capped so an agent calling another agent (or itself) can't recurse without bound, and a webhook_call step cannot be pointed back at Seclai's own API to work around these limits. If you need a blocked capability in automation, do it from your editor/CLI (where the full toolset is available) or ask us about a purpose-built tool.

Monitoring: Agents, Calls & Alerts

A client's detail page has tabs for keeping an eye on how it's used:

  • Agents — every agent whose workflow references this client, either through an MCP Client Call step or MCP tools enabled on a Prompt Call step. This is the same list that protects the client from accidental deletion (below).
  • Calls — a history of the tool calls your agents have made to this server during agent runs, newest first. Each row shows the tool name, whether it succeeded or failed, how long it took, and which agent made the call; filter by status or time range and page through the results. (Interactive Refresh and test‑connection calls are not recorded here — only calls made during real agent runs.)
  • Alerts — opt in to be notified when calls to this client misbehave. Five alert types are available: a failed call, consecutive failures, an error‑rate spike, a call burst (too many calls in a window), and an unusually slow call (relative to this client's own history). Configure them per‑client here, or set account‑wide defaults (applied to every client) from the account Alerts page. Triggered alerts appear in your alerts list and are emailed to the configured recipients.

Security

Seclai only connects to public https:// endpoints — private, loopback, and link‑local addresses are rejected (for the server URL, the OAuth server URL, and every endpoint discovered during the OAuth flow), and redirects to such addresses are not followed. Stored API keys and OAuth client secrets are never returned by the API or shown in the UI after they're saved. Error messages recorded for failed tool calls are scrubbed of credentials and truncated before being stored or emailed. A client that is still referenced by an agent cannot be deleted — Seclai blocks the deletion and lists the agents using it (see the Agents tab) so you can detach it first. Deleting a client removes Seclai's stored copy of its OAuth access/refresh tokens and makes its saved configuration inaccessible; the underlying secrets are fully purged when you close your account. (Deletion removes Seclai's tokens but does not revoke them at the provider — revoke there too if the grant must be invalidated immediately.)

For a connected OAuth client you can also Disconnect (from its Configuration tab) without deleting it: this revokes Seclai's stored OAuth tokens but keeps the client, its alert configs, call history, and agent wiring intact, so you can reconnect later without re-creating it. Disconnecting is also available programmatically via the disconnect_mcp_client MCP tool.

MCP Tools

MCP clients can also be managed programmatically through Seclai's own MCP server: list_mcp_clients, get_mcp_client, create_mcp_client, update_mcp_client, delete_mcp_client, disconnect_mcp_client (revoke a connected OAuth client's tokens without deleting it), test_mcp_client_connection, refresh_mcp_client_tools (fetch and cache the server's tool catalog), describe_mcp_client_tools (the cached tools in compact form, with the mcp:<client_id>:<tool_name> IDs to enable on a prompt-call step), and get_agents_using_mcp_client (the agents referencing a client — check this before deleting one), and list_mcp_client_calls (the tool-call history shown on the Calls tab, with status/time filters). Alerts on a client are managed with the standard list_alert_configs / create_alert_config tools: pass mcp_client_id for a specific client, or use scope='mcp_client' (list) / omit the id (create) for account‑wide defaults. The preconfigured server catalog is also exposed read-only through list_mcp_catalog (browse the directory of popular servers) and list_managed_providers (the managed-OAuth providers configured on this deployment). Secrets are never returned by these tools, and the interactive OAuth authorization must still be completed in the web app.

Next Steps