The master key is an AES secret key (128 or 256 bit) that's used by Artifactory to securely synchronize files between cluster nodes. It is responsible for encrypting and decrypting the shared data in the database. The master key is not used for communication between the different JFrog Platform products (unlike the join key, which is used to communicate between Artifactory, Xray, and other JFrog services).
Important
The master key is set per product, and must be the same for all the nodes in the same service (when using HA).