Docker OpenClaw E2EE

This guide walks you through pointing OpenClaw at a BLACKBOX AI end-to-end encrypted model endpoint from inside a Docker container. All requests are sealed with ECDH + AES-256-GCM before they leave your machine and only decrypted inside the GPU enclave.

Prerequisites

You need the following installed on your host — links point at the official install pages, we won't repeat them here:

Step 1 — Clone the orchestrator repo

git clone https://github.com/blackboxai-dev/openclaw-docker-e2e-encrypted.git
cd openclaw-docker-e2e-encrypted

The repository ships a Dockerfile, a docker-compose.yml, and a pre-baked OpenClaw config. During the build it clones bb-cc-proxy from its own upstream repo (github.com/blackboxai-dev/bb-cc-proxy) — you never need to interact with the proxy repo directly.

Step 2 — Configure your environment

Copy the example env file and fill in your values:

cp .env.example .env

Edit .env:

ENC_MODEL_URL=https://your-org.blackbox.ai

# REQUIRED — your BLACKBOX AI API key
BLACKBOX_API_KEY=sk-your-key-here

# OPTIONAL — defaults to google/gemma-4-31b-it
# ENC_MODEL_ID=google/gemma-4-31b-it

.env is in .gitignore by default so your key won't be committed.

Step 3 — Build the container

docker compose build openclaw

This produces one image (openclaw-enc:latest) containing both bb-cc-proxy and the openclaw CLI.

Step 4 — Run a smoke test

Verify the whole path — attestation, ECDH handshake, encrypted request, decrypted reply, OpenClaw dispatch — with a single one-shot command:

docker compose run --rm openclaw \
  openclaw agent --local --session-key poc:smoketest \
  --message "In one sentence, what model are you?"

You should see output ending with something like:

[entrypoint] starting bb-cc-proxy
[entrypoint]   upstream : https://your-org.blackbox.ai/enc/google/gemma-4-31b-it
[entrypoint]   local    : http://127.0.0.1:8080/v1
[entrypoint] waiting for proxy /health ... ready.
cc_proxy.session: ECDH shared key established (session_id=...)
[provider-transport-fetch] start provider=bbenc model=google/gemma-4-31b-it
POST /v1/chat/completions HTTP/1.1 200
Hello! I'm Gemma 4 31B IT, running on encrypted BLACKBOX AI infrastructure.
[agent] run <uuid> ended with stopReason=stop

If you see the model reply, the encrypted round-trip works.

Step 5 — Interactive chat

For an interactive session, drop into the container's shell:

docker compose run --rm openclaw

You now have openclaw available with the proxy running in the background. Try any of:

# TUI chat
openclaw chat

# Single agent turn
openclaw agent --local --session-key work:daily --message "Summarise these logs..."

# Verify OpenClaw sees the proxy
openclaw config validate

# Hit the proxy directly (useful for debugging)
curl -s http://127.0.0.1:8080/v1/chat/completions \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BLACKBOX_API_KEY" \
  -d '{"model":"'"$ENC_MODEL_ID"'","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hi"}]}'

Type exit to leave the container. Your OpenClaw workspace (pairing tokens, session history, skills) persists in a Docker volume named openclaw-workspace, so subsequent runs pick up where you left off.

Step 6 — Point another CLI at the proxy (optional)

The proxy is also reachable from your host at http://127.0.0.1:8080 while the container is running (port 8080 is published in docker-compose.yml). Any OpenAI-compatible tool works — set:

Troubleshooting

Cleaning up

docker compose down -v          # stop the container and remove the workspace volume
docker rmi openclaw-enc:latest  # remove the image

That's it — you now have OpenClaw talking to your encrypted BLACKBOX AI model inside a fully containerised environment.