Authentication

Requests for calling an API can be authenticated using either of the following methods:

  • Token-based authentication: Requests are authenticated using a token.

  • AK/SK-based authentication: Requests are authenticated by encrypting the request body using an AK/SK.

Token-based Authentication

Note

The validity period of a token is 24 hours. When using a token for authentication, cache it to prevent frequently calling the Identity and Access Management (IAM) API used to obtain a user token.

A token specifies temporary permissions in a computer system. During API authentication using a token, the token is added to requests to get permissions for calling the API.

In Making an API Request, the process of calling the API used to obtain a user token is described. After a token is obtained, the X-Auth-Token header field must be added to requests to specify the token when other APIs are called. For example, if the token is ABCDEFJ...., X-Auth-Token: ABCDEFJ.... can be added to a request as follows: