Shipping is the easy half. The hard half is deciding what the thing is supposed to do for someone who has never read your roadmap and does not care about your architecture.
This piece walks through how we think about it at Paycux, what we have changed our minds about, and where the sharp edges are.
Common security pitfalls in API design
Common security pitfalls in API design is where this gets concrete. Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Lack of authentication and authorization controls
Lack of authentication and authorization controls deserves its own treatment. Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
- Choose defaults as carefully as features
- Settle the name before you ship the thing
- Ship the smallest honest version
- Say plainly what the feature does not do
Injection attacks
That brings us to injection attacks. Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
Defaults are the product. Most people will never open the settings screen, which means the behaviour you chose for them is the behaviour they will experience forever.
Overexposure of data
Overexposure of data deserves its own treatment. Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits.
Improper rate limiting
Improper rate limiting is where this gets concrete. Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
Lack of logging and monitoring
Consider lack of logging and monitoring. Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Ship the smallest version that is honest about its limits. A feature that does one thing completely beats one that does five things with an asterisk on each.
Best practices when building secure APIs
Best practices when building secure APIs is where this gets concrete. Defaults are the product. Most people will never open the settings screen, which means the behaviour you chose for them is the behaviour they will experience forever.
Naming is design work. If the team argues about what to call something, the disagreement is usually about what it is, and shipping before that is settled means shipping the confusion to customers.
Where this leaves us
None of this is exotic. It is the ordinary discipline of deciding what you own, writing down what you assume, and making the failures loud enough to notice.
If you are working through the same problem and want to compare notes, the docs cover the mechanics and the console shows the behaviour on your own data.
Everything here, already built
Sign-in, enterprise SSO, directory provisioning, roles and an audit trail behind one API. Start with the quickstart and have a working sign-in this afternoon.