Discord Access Control¶

Missy enforces fine-grained access control on Discord interactions at two levels: DM policies (direct messages) and guild policies (server messages).

DM policies¶

The dm_policy field controls how the bot handles direct messages. It applies per-account.

disabled (default)¶

The bot ignores all direct messages entirely.

discord:
  accounts:
    - dm_policy: disabled

allowlist¶

Only users whose Discord user IDs appear in dm_allowlist can send DMs to the bot.

discord:
  accounts:
    - dm_policy: allowlist
      dm_allowlist:
        - "123456789012345678"
        - "987654321098765432"

pairing¶

Users must complete a pairing handshake before the bot responds to their DMs. This is useful for teams where you want to vet users before granting access.

discord:
  accounts:
    - dm_policy: pairing

open¶

Any user can send DMs without restriction. Use this only in trusted environments.

discord:
  accounts:
    - dm_policy: open

Production recommendation

Use allowlist or pairing in production. The open policy lets any Discord user interact with your Missy instance.

Guild policies¶

Guild policies control bot behavior per-server. Each guild (identified by its ID) gets its own policy.

discord:
  accounts:
    - guild_policies:
        "111222333444555666":
          enabled: true
          require_mention: true
          allowed_channels: ["bot-commands", "general"]
          allowed_roles: ["Developers", "Admins"]
          allowed_users: []
          mode: full

Policy fields¶

Field	Type	Default	Description
`enabled`	bool	`true`	Master switch for this guild
`require_mention`	bool	`false`	Bot only responds when @-mentioned
`allowed_channels`	list	`[]`	Channel names where bot responds (empty = all)
`allowed_roles`	list	`[]`	Roles required to interact (empty = all)
`allowed_users`	list	`[]`	User IDs permitted to interact (empty = all)
`mode`	string	`full`	Capability mode (see below)

Capability modes¶

Mode	Description
`full`	All capabilities enabled (tools, shell, etc. -- subject to main policy)
`no_tools`	Chat only, no tool invocations
`safe_chat_only`	Chat only, no tools, no context from previous sessions

Channel filtering¶

When allowed_channels is empty, the bot responds in all channels. When populated, only messages in the listed channels are processed:

guild_policies:
  "111222333444555666":
    allowed_channels: ["bot-commands"]
    require_mention: false

Combine require_mention with channel filtering

For busy servers, set require_mention: true in general channels and create a dedicated bot-commands channel with require_mention: false.

Role-based access¶

When allowed_roles is populated, users must hold at least one of the listed roles:

guild_policies:
  "111222333444555666":
    allowed_roles: ["AI-Users", "Admins"]

Users without a matching role are silently ignored.

Bot-to-bot interaction¶

By default, messages from other bots are ignored (ignore_bots: true). To allow another bot to interact with Missy:

discord:
  accounts:
    - ignore_bots: true
      allow_bots_if_mention_only: true

With allow_bots_if_mention_only: true, bot messages that explicitly @-mention Missy are processed even when ignore_bots is true.

Audit trail¶

All Discord access control decisions are logged. View them with:

missy discord audit --limit 20

Events include:

discord.dm.denied -- DM rejected by policy
discord.guild.denied -- Guild message rejected by policy
discord.role.denied -- User lacks required role
discord.channel.denied -- Message in disallowed channel