Place a gate

You place and manage gates in the BotShield Console. Placing a gate creates a Draft. The gate starts answering verifications when you Activate it. This page walks through the whole path, from the first key to a live gate.

Check the Development | Production toggle in the page header before you start. Keys and gates belong to one environment, and a gate’s environment is fixed when you place it. Start in Development: it is not billed and has no business requirements.

Create a site key

The widget authenticates with a site key. It is public, so it is locked to the origins you list.

Open Site Keys

Go to Settings → Developer Tools and select the Site Keys tab. Select New Site Key.

Name the key and pick an environment

Enter a Name, for example “Production checkout”. Under Environment, choose test for Development gates or live for Production gates. A test key starts with pk_test_ and a live key starts with pk_live_.

Add allowed origins

Under Allowed Origins, add each origin that will host the widget, for example https://www.meridianairlines.com. Origins are matched exactly. Use https://*.meridianairlines.com to allow every subdomain.

Create

Select Create Site Key. The key appears in the list with its origins. You can edit the origins or revoke the key later from the same list.

A live site key must have at least one allowed origin. The Console rejects a live key that is created or saved with an empty list. A test key can have an empty list, and a key with no allowed origins accepts requests from any origin. Test keys also accept localhost and 127.0.0.1 without listing them.

If you plan to verify on your server or run the server-to-server flow, also create an API key on the API Keys tab. The same tab shows your Organization ID with a Copy button. It is the value in the organization_id claim of every verification token, so keep it in your server configuration. See Keys and environments.

Place the gate

Open BotShield Gate

Select BotShield Gate in the sidebar. The Deployments tab lists your gates for the environment selected in the header. Select Place a gate.

Fill in the modal

The modal reads “Name it and pick a verification mode. You’ll configure the rest and activate on the next screen.”

Field	What to enter
Gate name	A label for your team. Placeholder: “e.g. Gate at Checkout”.
Key	The identifier you pass as `scope`. It fills in from the name until you edit it. Letters, numbers, `_`, `.` and `-` are kept; anything else becomes `_`. The helper line shows how it will be used: `scope="checkout"` in the SDK, case-sensitive, with the environment.
Gate type	Human: “Is a real human here?” or Age: “Is this human over 13, 18 or 21?”
Verify over (Age only)	13+, 18+ or 21+. The default is 21+. The caption reads “Positive-only: Over 21 Verified or Unavailable. Never a date of birth.”
Verification mode	Recent Presence: “Returning humans pass instantly — within their earned TTL” or Live: “New biometric every time”. An Age Gate is locked to Live: “Age Gate always runs a live check — the age signal is read on the phone during the passkey ceremony.”

Confirm with your passkey (Production only)

In Production the modal shows a Passkey badge: “Placing a gate is sealed with your passkey — only a proven human places a gate.” Select Place gate and confirm with your Console passkey when prompted. In Development there is no passkey step.

Check the key

The gate opens in a detail panel as a Draft. Its key is shown under the name. If the key you asked for was already taken, BotShield adds a suffix such as -2, so copy the key from this panel, not from memory.

You can rename the gate, switch the verification mode, and change an Age Gate’s threshold later from the gate’s Configuration card. The gate type and the environment do not change after placement. A key is unique within one environment. You can place a gate with the same key in Development and in Production. They are two independent gates with their own settings, and BotShield uses the one in the environment of the credential that calls it: pk_test_ and bs_dev_ keys reach Development gates, pk_live_ and bs_production_ keys reach Production gates.

Draft, Active, Archived

State	How you get there	What happens at runtime
Draft	Place a gate	The gate does not answer. The widget shows “Unavailable” and fires `botshield:failure` with reason `gate_not_active`. `create-verification-link` returns a `400` error saying the scope is not defined or not active.
Active	Activate on a Draft	The gate answers verifications. Production verifications are metered; Development verifications are not billed.
Archived	Deactivate in the gate panel, or Close deployment in the list menu	The gate stops answering, exactly like a Draft. Its logs stay available.

Archiving is permanent. An archived gate cannot be activated again; activation returns a 409 error. To bring a placement back, place a new gate and check the key it was given.

To activate, open the Draft and select Activate in the header, or Activate → in the Next steps list. To archive an active gate, select Deactivate, then Confirm when the panel asks “Stop answering verifications?”.

Production requirements

A Development gate activates with no checks. A Production gate activates only when all three of these are true, checked in this order:

Your business is verified. Select Verify Business on the BotShield Gate page and use a company email address on your company’s domain. Verification is automatic. Personal email domains such as Gmail or Outlook are declined.
You have an active plan. Choose one on the Plan tab.
You confirmed with your Console passkey in the last 5 minutes. Add a passkey under Settings → Profile → Passkeys if you do not have one. The Console prompts you when a fresh confirmation is needed.

If a requirement is missing, Activate fails with one of these codes and the Console shows the message:

Code	Message	Fix
`org_not_verified`	Business verification required before activating a production deployment.	Complete Verify Business.
`no_active_plan`	An active plan is required before activating a production deployment.	Choose a plan on the Plan tab.
`passkey_required`	A console passkey is required for production. Add one under Settings → Profile → Passkeys, then try again.	Add a Console passkey.
`passkey_stepup_required`	Confirm with your console passkey to continue — the confirmation must be recent.	Confirm with your passkey, then select Activate again.

Placing a Production gate can also return the two passkey codes.

The embed snippet

The gate’s Integration card shows the site key for the gate’s environment, a link to its allowed origins, and a snippet with a Copy button. The snippet is ready to paste: it carries the site key, the gate key as scope, and scan-mode="modal", which names the widget’s QR code and mobile hand-off flow.

<!-- Load BotShield SDK -->
<script src="https://cdn.botshield.ai/sdk.js"></script>

<!-- Render the verification widget -->
<botshield-verify
  site-key="pk_live_…"
  scope="checkout"
  scan-mode="modal"
  onsuccess="onBotShieldSuccess"
  onfailure="onBotShieldFailure"
></botshield-verify>

<script>
  function onBotShieldSuccess({ token, request_id }) {
    // Send the token (or the request_id when token is null) to your backend
    // and validate it there before you trust it.
  }
  function onBotShieldFailure({ reason }) {
    console.error('BotShield verification failed:', reason);
  }
</script>

If the card shows pk_live_… or pk_test_… as a placeholder, you have no site key in that environment yet. Create one first. See Web component for every attribute and event.

The gate detail panel

Select a gate in the Deployments list to open its panel. A Draft shows only Overview. Active and Archived gates show three tabs.

Overview
Verification Logs
Activity Logs

A date range (Last 7 days, Last 30 days, Last 90 days) and Export CSV for the summary.
Metric tiles: Total attestations, Human Verified, BotShield ID Active (verifications that passed on Recent Presence without a phone step) and Human Unavailable. An Age Gate shows Over N Verified and Age Unavailable as well.
Configuration: gate type, age threshold (Age Gate) and verification mode. Changes save automatically.
Health: last attestation, last webhook sent, error rate, BotShield ID adoption and Unavailable rate.
Integration: site key, allowed origins and the embed snippet.
Next steps: place, activate, then test in the Sandbox.

One row per verification, 25 per page, with the columns Request ID, Status, Duration and Created. Filter by All, Verified, Failed, Blocked, Pending, Expired or Prechecks. On an Age Gate, each row also carries an age label: Over N Verified or Age Unavailable.Export CSV downloads the rows on screen with the columns Request ID, Status, Age, Age Threshold, Age Source, Duration, Created and Error. Use the Request ID to match a row to the request_id your code received.

Next steps

Web component

Put the widget on your page.

Verify on your server

Check the result before you trust it.

Testing

Try the gate in the Console Sandbox.

Keys and environments

Site keys, API keys and how the two environments differ.

Get Started

BotShield Gate

Trusted Accounts

Agents Ask

Webhooks

Console

Server SDK

Integrations

Concepts

Changelog

Create a site key

Place the gate

Draft, Active, Archived

Production requirements

The embed snippet

The gate detail panel

Next steps

Web component

Verify on your server

Testing

Keys and environments

​Create a site key

​Place the gate

​Draft, Active, Archived

​Production requirements

​The embed snippet

​The gate detail panel

​Next steps

Web component

Verify on your server

Testing

Keys and environments

Create a site key

Place the gate

Draft, Active, Archived

Production requirements

The embed snippet

The gate detail panel

Next steps