Permissions and approvals

A bot works on its own by default. It asks you once for each new kind of action and remembers your answer. A very dangerous action asks you every time. You control this in two ways: with your answers to its approval cards, and with the Permissions settings.

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What a bot does without asking

• You asked for it: when your own message for a task asks for an action, for example “add the meeting to my calendar”, the bot does it without an approval card. This includes a change of your own Google account, for example an edit of a document that you own. The reason it shows is “You asked for this action.”
• You answered its question or offer: a short reply to the bot’s own message counts as your request. When the bot writes “Tell me which one and I’ll book it” and you answer “ok, pick 11:00 am Monday”, it books that time without a card. This never counts for a payment: an amount or a payee must be in your own words.
• You asked it to confirm first: when your message says “confirm with me before you send it”, “check with me”, “ask me” or “wait for me”, the bot asks you first, even for an action you asked for.
• It reads your own data: a read of your own Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets or Slides never asks.
• You gave a permission before: an action of a kind that you approved for good on an earlier card runs without a card (see “Answer an approval card” below).
• Very dangerous actions ask every time, even when you asked for them: moving or spending money, deleting, sending to 10 or more people or posting in public, changing passwords, permissions, sharing or forwarding, and accepting terms. The bot also asks every time when a web address holds hidden data. When the bot offers such an action, for example to delete an account on a site, it says that it will ask you first.

Some actions are their own kind of permission, so a permission for your private files does not cover them:

• An invitation from your Google Calendar: “Invite people from your Google Calendar”.
• A change to a Google file, folder or event that other people can see, for example a shared document or an event with guests: “Change what other people can see in your Google Docs”. The same permission exists for your Google Drive, your Google Sheets, your Google Slides and your Google Calendar.

An email goes out only from the email card in the chat. When the bot tries to send, reply to or forward an email with one of your other apps, for example Gmail or Outlook through Apps, the app action does not run, and the bot writes the email on the email card instead. An app can still save a draft in your mailbox. See “Email from a bot” below.

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Set permission rules

The answers are Do it without asking, Ask me first and Never. For “where”, choose anywhere or only for a site, an address or a place; for email, to anyone or only to. A bot can have up to 50 rules. To remove a permission or a rule, click Remove on its row. “Removed.” shows with Undo for 5 seconds. Undo puts the permission or the rule back as it was. A removed permission asks again the next time. The actions are:

• Send emails
• Send messages
• Buy or pay for things
• Post in public
• Delete files
• Use websites
• Use the desktop apps
• Write and run code (this also lets it hand coding work to the coding agent)
• Change calendars
• Read and save files
• Hand work to helper bots
• Change its routines
• Propose new bots

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Answer an approval card

When the bot asks, the chat shows an Approval needed card. The card also shows in Needs you on All bots, with the same reason and Details. The card says in plain words what the action does and why the bot asks. Details opens the facts of the action as labelled rows, for example the recipient or the file.

• Allow always lets the bot do this kind of action from now on, without asking. The bot keeps a permission for the tool, the kind of action and the target, for example “Change your Gmail” or “Send email to example.com”. The card names it in plain words. A different kind of action or a different target, for example another email domain or another site, asks once again. Allow always also approves the other waiting cards of the bot that the new permission covers.
• Allow once lets the bot do this action one time. It keeps nothing.
• Deny refuses the action.

A very dangerous action asks every time and has no Allow always: moving or spending money, deleting, sending to many people or posting in public, changing passwords, sharing or access, and accepting terms. Under the buttons, the card says what Allow always keeps, for example “Allow always lets this bot change your Gmail from now on, without asking you. You can remove it in Settings > Permissions.” Settings > Permissions opens that section. Needs you shows the same sentence under the request. While your choice saves, the button says Saving. When you click Deny, the bot does not ask about the same action again in that task until you write to it again. This includes the same message to the same people through another app. A message to another person, phone number or channel is a new action, and the bot asks about it. The bot tells you in its answer what it did not do, and the step list shows the action as Skipped. When you write again, for example “send it after all”, the bot can ask again. A card that nobody answers is not a deny: the bot can ask again. After you decide, the card shows your answer, for example “You chose Allow always: Change your Gmail.” A card that a permission approved without you reads “This no longer needed your approval, so the bot went on.” A card that nobody answers expires after 24 hours. To see or remove what a bot may do, open Settings, then Permissions, and use the list Rules and permissions.

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Email from a bot

When a bot writes an email, the chat shows an email card with From, To, Cc, Subject and the text. The bot checks the draft against your request before the card shows, so it can correct the draft first. You can change each part on the card. Click Send to send it from your own account, or Discard to delete it. The email also shows in Needs you. In Permissions, Email drafts sets what happens when the bot writes an email: Needs approval (the default: the card waits for Send), Send without asking (an email that you asked for, to people your own words name, goes out with no card), or no email drafts for this bot. A send to 10 or more people still waits for you to press Send. An email from the bot’s own address also needs the switch Send email from this address (see The bot’s email address).

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Websites and the desktop

The first time a bot wants to use a new website, the card Browser approval needed asks “Allow the bot to use (site)?”:

• Allow always lets it use that site from now on. The site shows in Rules and permissions.
• Allow for all sites lets it open any site without asking. RelayHub asks you to confirm with Allow all sites.
• Deny refuses the site.

When a link that you asked the bot to open goes on to another site (a short link or a booking link, for example), the bot does not ask again for that site. The desktop asks in the same way, with the card Desktop approval needed. When the bot hands control of its browser or desktop to you, the card records how it ended: “You gave back control at (time).”, “Skipped.” after Skip, or “The browser session ended.” when the session ended on its own. Under Show activity in the Now tab, each row names the action, for example “Clicked in LibreOffice Calc”.