API security is a major factor in determining the safety of cloud environments. What are the challenges to watch out for in this? Here is a look.
API security is a factor in determining the safety of cloud environments from external threats. Enterprises have to ensure that timely checks are done to avoid such intrusions. Adequately integrated and secure public cloud APIs can facilitate many abundant opportunities for developers. APIs also play a key role in bringing core features to apps and interconnecting apps to programs and external services.
How do you make sure of this smooth running of APIs in public cloud environments? What are the challenges to watch out for? Here is a look.
1. Shoddy Access Controls
Enterprises should ensure that only the right personnel have access to applications and projects. Half-baked access protocols and inadequate authentication systems can lead to problems like cross-system vulnerabilities, data oversharing, or worse. Multi-factor authentication processes and token systems can make a huge difference here and ensure the necessary API security.
2. Absence of Configurable Rates and Throttling
Attack types such as DDoS are significant challenges for API security. In such attacks, applications will see a massive surge in traffic from external sources, and poorly executed APIs allow this flooding of false requests. The resultant problems include performance degradation, downtimes, and service crashes. An ideal solution to this problem is ensuring that companies use APIs with configurable rates and throttling controls, giving better control over user behavior.
3. Excessive Exposure
A poorly designed API can expose underlying information to potential breachers, both on user and technical ends. They might also access business logic, API syntax, structure, etc., and launch an attack based on the exposed information. With proper API security measures, application data is safeguarded against threats and breaches.
4. Inferior Encryption for API Security
Data comes in two types - in motion and at rest. When requests are made, data is in motion, and some APIs leave the data unprotected. Without a secure path, such data is vulnerable to attacks while in transit. Hackers can easily breach outdated or poorly executed data pathways. Even with data at rest, poor encryption can be a challenge. Both these problems can be solved with more robust encryption protocols and transport security layers and systems. Another critical factor is to ensure that these systems are always running in the latest versions.
5. Rushing Products without Security Checks
Deadline pressures and market release dates often become a problem for applications. While it is great to have a strict production schedule, unforeseen issues can delay the procedure. Identified security issues should be resolved, and there should be time for proper scrutiny. Review and testing cycles shouldn't have small windows to operate. Deadlines shouldn't take priority over API quality. It is always better to resolve problems and then have a product release than to find out avoidable issues right after release.
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