Data access boundaries

Target Audience: Developers & non-technical users defining how Toucan AI accesses data in multi-tenant products.

TL;DR

Toucan AI separates platform data (stored in Toucan) from your business data (stored in your connected databases). Access to your data is always gated by authentication, permissions, and row-level security — not by copying your warehouse into Toucan.

When to use this

Use this page with Security boundaries (embed) to design a secure integration and understand shared responsibilities.

Three data zones

Zone	What it is	Where it lives
Platform	Accounts, dashboards, chart configs, AI history, encrypted DB credentials	Toucan AI database
Your database	Tables and rows (source of truth)	Your infrastructure
Request-time results	Rows returned for a chart or AI answer	Processed per request — not a bulk Toucan copy

See Data storage & retention for query flow and caching.

How access is enforced

Embed tokens carry identity, permissions, and attributes for security rules (all database configuration can be passed as attributes).
Row-level security (RLS) filters which rows each user can query.
Column-level security (CLS) can restrict which columns are visible.
Organization isolation separates one customer’s Toucan configuration from another’s.

Security responsibilities

Responsibility	Your app / backend	Toucan AI platform
End-user authentication	✅	—
Embed token generation	✅	—
API key storage	✅	—
Define RLS attributes & rules	✅	—
Enforce RLS at query time	—	✅
Store platform config & AI history	—	✅
Store your table data	✅ (your DB)	— (queries only)

Typical risks

Missing RLS on sensitive tables
Sensitive content in AI chat that gets stored in conversation history

Data access boundaries

TL;DRCopy Anchor Link

When to use thisCopy Anchor Link

Three data zonesCopy Anchor Link

How access is enforcedCopy Anchor Link

Security responsibilitiesCopy Anchor Link

Typical risksCopy Anchor Link

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