API Security Gartner Predicition
By 2022, Gartner estimates that the most popular attack vector will be spear phishing, resulting in violations of company web applications. Gartner predicts API violence. APIs enable millions of connected devices to communicate with backend servers, gain access to data, and communicate with one another.
Low security in the API can lead to painful and damaging effects like hacker attacks and data violations.
According to Gartner
- Attacks and data breaches involving inadequately secured APIs are occurring regularly.
- Protecting web APIs solely with general-purpose application security solutions has proven to be ineffective over the years. Each new API represents a new and potentially unique attack vector into your systems, which you should be aware of.
What does this API security mean?
APIs became a de facto standard for the modern web during the post-iPhone era, the post-app Store era. Two primary drivers ensured that many application programming interfaces were created: the growth of mobile applications that require web-based backend APIs and the SPA architecture.
This means the internet is now part of the API, meaning that API security is now the security of web applications.
According to a Gartner report (by CSO), 40 percent of the attacks by web applications are already via APIs rather than user interfaces.
Moreover, analysts predict that by 2021, the figure will increase to 90%. By 2022, the most prevalent vector of attack is API violation, Gartner says. According to our company data, API requests accounted for 53% of all web-based attacks in Q1-Q2 2020.
For starters, an API approach is nothing new or innovative — it’s standard for the web. Microsoft designed the XML-RPC protocol in 1998, and I first saw SOAP in 2003 as a Java developer.
Except for a few rare API protocols, we’ve defined them all. We should now discuss the attack surface. The API attack surface can be thought of as a layer cake:
There is also a control layer for basic controls like request rates. The API gateway usually implements all of the security controls. You don’t have to look into the request data deeply.
The layer between the two is the data protocol. It is better to focus on certain threats here. The application format for each API is a data serialization format from XML to binary gRPC. This means you can describe how objects, such as application requests can be converted into strings.
Serialization attacks have become more common with APIs. Application security is known to have XXE (XML external entity) vulnerability. The remote code execution vulnerability is well-known for Dot Net applications. But GraphQL and gRPC seem to be evident.
The application layer should be compared to standard web application requests. It’s just two more API-like layers followed by a regular web request. This means that everything from the OWASP Top-10 and WASC to more exotic attacks such as race conditions and insufficient random number generation is still present. The only difference is that the request for a data format is (i.e., encoding). It means avoiding signature-based security solutions such as WAFs for attackers.
How to develop an effective API security policy?
For any API program to accomplish, a security policy manages access and prevents attack systems while also interacting with digital ecosystems.
API security strategies, including the use of API gateways, must be designed, implemented, and managed by application leaders.
An API gateway is a method of decoupling the client interface from the backend implementation of your application. When a client submits a request, the API gateway divides it into multiple requests, routes them to the appropriate destinations, generates a response, and keeps track of everything.
Protecting Sensitive User Information
Because APIs were completely unprotected, and a data breach occurred, these attacks feel more personal to end-users than they would if the breach occurred elsewhere.
When cybercriminals target and access users’ applications, the vulnerability spreads to both the user’s device and the organization’s entire network.
API security enables you to maintain customer trust while also protecting your system.
A firewall keeps hackers out of the data server.
Insufficient API security allows hackers to access your business’s database servers via your API. Your precious business secrets are stored on these servers, and if they fall into the wrong hands, they could cause significant damage. The development of robust API security is essential for protecting your intellectual property, revenue streams, and reputation.
