Audit MCP Endpoint Calls

VerifiedreShapr 0.2.3September 4, 2026

Use this guide to enable audit on one Configuration Plan and verify the records produced by successful and rejected MCP requests. Audit is an endpoint policy: enabling Gateway telemetry alone does not cause every Exposition to emit audit events.

Audit events are OpenTelemetry log records marked with log.type=audit. The Gateway exports them through its OpenTelemetry Logs pipeline; storage, routing, retention, and access control belong to the configured Collector and telemetry backends.

Prerequisites

You need:

• a reShapr Gateway and CLI at version 0.2.3;
• Gateway OpenTelemetry logs configured with Observe the reShapr Gateway;
• a telemetry or audit backend where you can search exported records;
• reshapr login completed for the target organization;
• an imported Service, its backend endpoint, and a Gateway Group ID;
• curl and jq.

Set the resource inputs:

export SERVICE_ID='<service-id>'
export BACKEND_ENDPOINT='https://api.example.com'
export GATEWAY_GROUP_ID='<gateway-group-id>'

Create an audited Configuration Plan

Create an API-key-protected Plan with audit enabled. Keep the structured response only long enough to extract its ID and generated key:

CONFIG_JSON="$(
  reshapr config create 'audited-endpoint-check' \
    --serviceId "${SERVICE_ID}" \
    --backendEndpoint "${BACKEND_ENDPOINT}" \
    --apiKey \
    --audit \
    --output json
)"

export RESHAPR_CONFIG_ID="$(jq -er '.id' <<<"${CONFIG_JSON}")"
export RESHAPR_API_KEY="$(jq -er '.apiKey' <<<"${CONFIG_JSON}")"
unset CONFIG_JSON

The --audit option applies to every Exposition created from this Configuration Plan. It does not enable audit globally for other Plans.

Create a named Exposition and capture its ID:

export EXPOSITION_ID="$(
  reshapr expo create \
    --configuration "${RESHAPR_CONFIG_ID}" \
    --gateway-group "${GATEWAY_GROUP_ID}" \
    --name audited-endpoint-check \
    --output json \
  | jq -er '.id'
)"

reshapr expo get "${EXPOSITION_ID}"
export MCP_URL='https://<gateway-host>/mcp/<organization>/audited-endpoint-check'

Wait until the Exposition lists the expected Gateway endpoint before sending requests.

Generate audit events

Send a successful discovery request with the generated key:

export MCP_DISCOVERY_REQUEST='{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"server/discover","params":{"_meta":{"io.modelcontextprotocol/protocolVersion":"2026-07-28","io.modelcontextprotocol/clientInfo":{"name":"reshapr-audit-check","version":"0.2.3"},"io.modelcontextprotocol/clientCapabilities":{}}}}'

curl --fail --silent --show-error \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  --header 'Accept: application/json, text/event-stream' \
  --header 'MCP-Protocol-Version: 2026-07-28' \
  --header 'Mcp-Method: server/discover' \
  --header "x-reshapr-key: ${RESHAPR_API_KEY}" \
  --data "${MCP_DISCOVERY_REQUEST}" \
  "${MCP_URL}" | jq '.result.supportedVersions'

Send the same request with an invalid key:

curl --silent --show-error --output /dev/null --write-out '%{http_code}\n' \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  --header 'MCP-Protocol-Version: 2026-07-28' \
  --header 'Mcp-Method: server/discover' \
  --header 'x-reshapr-key: deliberately-invalid' \
  --data "${MCP_DISCOVERY_REQUEST}" \
  "${MCP_URL}"

The first request must return a JSON-RPC result and the second must return HTTP 401.

Inspect MCP call events

Allow for Collector batching and export delay, then search the configured audit sink for log.type=audit and event.action=server/discover.

An MCP call event can contain:

Attribute	Meaning
log.type	Always audit for an audit record
event.action	MCP method, such as server/discover or tools/call
event.outcome	success or failure
event.duration	Gateway call duration in milliseconds
service.name, service.version	Service exposed through the Plan
organization.id	Owning organization
mcp.request.id	JSON-RPC request ID, when present
mcp.session.id	MCP session ID for session-based protocols, when present
mcp.target.name	Tool or Resource name, when applicable
mcp.error.code	JSON-RPC error code for a failed call, when present
mcp.response.size	Response size in bytes
source.ip	Caller address, when available
user.id	Authenticated JWT subject, when available
trace.id	Active trace ID, when available

The successful discovery request must have at least event.outcome=success, the Service and organization attributes, mcp.request.id, and event.duration.

Call one known read-only Tool from the same Exposition to produce event.action=tools/call. Use mcp.target.name, service.name, and trace.id when present to correlate its audit record with Gateway and backend spans.

Inspect authentication-failure events

Search for log.type=audit, event.action=authentication, and the affected Service. Authentication-failure records can contain:

Attribute	Meaning
event.outcome	Always failure
event.reason	Rejection reason, such as invalid_api_key, missing_bearer_token, invalid_token, or missing_scope
http.response.status_code	HTTP rejection status
service.id, service.name, service.version	Affected Service
organization.id	Owning organization
source.ip	Caller address, when available
trace.id	Active trace ID, when available

The rejected request in this guide must have event.reason=invalid_api_key and http.response.status_code=401.

Application logs explain runtime behavior, traces connect work across boundaries, and audit records answer which MCP action was attempted and with what outcome. Do not treat audit as a substitute for application diagnostics or distributed tracing.

Clean up

Delete the temporary Exposition before its Configuration Plan:

reshapr expo delete "${EXPOSITION_ID}"
reshapr config delete "${RESHAPR_CONFIG_ID}"
unset RESHAPR_API_KEY MCP_DISCOVERY_REQUEST

Result

The Configuration Plan enables audit for its Expositions, and the audit sink contains distinct successful-call and authentication-failure records marked with log.type=audit.

Limits

• Audit must be enabled independently on every Configuration Plan that requires it.
• Audit records are emitted only when OpenTelemetry Logs are available and export succeeds.
• Optional identity, source, session, target, error, and trace attributes depend on the request and authentication mode.
• Audit records can contain identifiers and network metadata. Protect their transport, storage, access, retention, and deletion according to your security requirements.
• reShapr does not provide an audit database, SIEM, compliance policy, or immutable retention mechanism.

Next step

Use Observe the reShapr Gateway to route records with log.type=audit to a dedicated sink. Use Security Capabilities and Limits to review endpoint authentication and audit boundaries.

The release-tagged audit implementation and public API contract remain the canonical references.