MCP

MCP Server

The Columbo MCP server lets an AI assistant read your Columbo data. Assistants that support MCP, such as Claude, connect to it directly and can then answer questions about your Audits, Scenarios, Tests, and their results.

The server provides read-only access. It cannot create, edit, delete, start, pause, or rescan anything.

The production server is available over Streamable HTTP at https://api.columbo.io/mcp.

Connecting an assistant

Add Columbo as a custom connector in your assistant and paste this address:

https://api.columbo.io/mcp

The assistant opens a Columbo page in your browser. Sign in with your usual Columbo email address and password, review what the application is asking for, and confirm. The assistant is connected from that point on.

Nothing needs to be copied by hand, and no Columbo checkout, Node.js installation, or npm command is required. Your password is entered on Columbo's own page and is never given to the assistant.

Connecting a script or a client without a browser

Assistants that let you set a request header, and scripts calling the endpoint directly, can use the same BasicAuth credentials as the rest of the Columbo API instead:

Authorization: Basic <base64(email:apiPassword)>

The API password is different from the password used to log in to Columbo and is shown in the Columbo user profile. It changes whenever the regular password changes.

Note that this credential is the full API credential: it also grants write access to the Columbo API. The browser flow above issues a separate token that can only read, and only through the MCP server, so prefer it wherever the assistant supports it.

Requests must also declare both content types the MCP transport can answer with:

Accept: application/json, text/event-stream

MCP client libraries send this header automatically. A request without it is rejected with status 406.

Managing connected applications

The Columbo user profile lists every application you have connected, when each was last used, and a button to disconnect it. Disconnecting takes effect immediately.

Changing your Columbo password disconnects every application at once. This is deliberate: a password change is what you do when you suspect something has been compromised.

What an assistant can see

Every request is authorized as your user. An assistant sees exactly the accounts and resources you may read, including the restrictions that apply to guest users, and nothing else.

The server exposes tools for the following data:

• Accounts: list and retrieve accounts
• Audits: retrieve Audits with their result summary, captured Pages, Checks, Scenarios, and sweeps
• Scenarios: list and retrieve Scenarios and Scenario Runs
• Tests: list and retrieve Tests
• Schedules: list and retrieve Schedules, and list their runs
• Parameters and Variables: list and retrieve both, and where each one is used
• Change history: the recorded configuration changes of an Audit, Scenario, Test, Schedule, or Variable

A typical request starts with list_accounts when the account ID is unknown. The assistant can then use the account ID to retrieve the Audits, Scenarios, Tests, or Schedules belonging to that account. The list is paginated and can be searched by account name, so an assistant working on behalf of a user with many accounts can go straight to the one that was named.

Investigating a result

Several tools answer a whole question in one call, which keeps an assistant from paging through large amounts of data to get there:

• get_audit_overview returns an Audit together with its result summary, configured Tests, attached Scenarios, running sweep, and evaluated Checks
• list_audit_page_errors returns the Pages that failed to load, with the status code and error that explain why
• list_audit_pages_failing_test and list_audit_pages_failing_check return the Pages where one Test or one Check failed
• get_scenario_run_predecessor returns the Scenario Run before a given one, so the two can be compared

Read-only access and redaction

Only read operations are available. The MCP server cannot create, edit, delete, start, pause, or rescan Columbo data.

Credentials that Columbo stores in order to do its work are removed before any data is sent to the assistant:

• API keys, API passwords, passwords, access and refresh tokens, and client secrets, including the password of an Audit's or Scenario's HTTP authentication
• the value of every cookie and local storage entry, on Audits, on Scenarios, and on captured Pages. The name, domain, and flags are kept so a Page can still be examined
• the value a Scenario step types into a form field, which is how a login Scenario carries its password

Everything else an Audit records, including page content details such as titles, metatags, and detected tools, is returned as it is stored. If an audited site exposes sensitive data in a place Columbo captures, that data can reach the assistant.