API key authentication in Rest API - Mini Project: Build & Apply

API Key Authentication

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple REST API that requires users to provide an API key to access protected data. This is a common way to control who can use your API.

🎯 Goal: Create a basic API endpoint that checks for a valid API key sent in the request headers. If the key is correct, the API returns a success message. If not, it returns an error message.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a variable to store the valid API key.

Check the request headers for the API key.

Compare the provided key with the valid key.

Return a success message if the key matches.

Return an error message if the key is missing or incorrect.

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

API key authentication is used to protect APIs from unauthorized access by requiring a secret key.

💼 Career

Understanding API key authentication is important for backend developers and anyone working with web services and security.

1

Set up the valid API key

Create a variable called VALID_API_KEY and set it to the string "12345abcde".

Rest API

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Think of the API key as a secret password stored in a variable.

2

Get the API key from request headers

Create a variable called provided_key that gets the value of the "X-API-Key" header from the request.headers dictionary.

Rest API

VALID_API_KEY = "12345abcde"
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the get method on request.headers to safely get the API key.

3

Check if the API key is valid

Write an if statement that compares provided_key with VALID_API_KEY. If they are equal, set a variable response to "Access granted". Otherwise, set response to "Access denied".

Rest API

VALID_API_KEY = "12345abcde"
provided_key = request.headers.get("X-API-Key")
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use a simple if-else to compare the keys and set the response message.

4

Return the response message

Write a line to return or print the response variable so the API sends the message back to the user.

Rest API

VALID_API_KEY = "12345abcde"
provided_key = request.headers.get("X-API-Key")
if provided_key == VALID_API_KEY:
    response = "Access granted"
else:
    response = "Access denied"
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use print(response) to show the message.