# What does the VARTA error `tenant_forbidden` mean?

The catalogue reserves this code for a resource that exists but belongs to another tenant.


**HTTP status:** `403`  ·  **Type:** `permission_error`

## What it means

The catalogue reserves this code for a resource that exists but belongs to another tenant.

## What causes it

Cause not yet documented as a live path — by design, this platform does not raise it. Cross-tenant access is deliberately made indistinguishable from a missing resource (`backend/app/security/ownership.py`, `backend/app/api/v1/errors.py`), so a cross-tenant id returns `not_found` instead, precisely so the distinction can't be used to enumerate ids.

That substitution — and the cross-tenant rejection behind it — applies **in enforce mode**. On a default instance `auth_mode` is `"audit"` (`backend/app/core/config.py:26`), and `require_tenant` returns the resource without comparing tenants at all (`backend/app/security/ownership.py:51-52`): a cross-tenant id is neither rejected as `tenant_forbidden` nor masked as `not_found`, it simply succeeds. Object-level isolation is observed but not enforced there. See [Authentication](/docs/authentication).

## What to do

Treat `not_found` on an id you expect to exist as covering this case: you're most likely calling it with the wrong tenant's id.