implementing-api-gateway-security-controls

# Implementing API Gateway Security Controls ## When to Use - Deploying a centralized authentication and authorization layer for microservice APIs - Implementing rate limiting, throttling, and quota management across all API endpoints - Configuring request/response validation against OpenAPI specifications at the gateway level - Setting up TLS termination, mutual TLS, and certificate management for API traffic - Integrating WAF rules with the API gateway to block injection, XSS, and known attack patterns **Do not use** as the sole security layer. API gateways provide defense in depth but backend services must also validate authorization and input. ## Prerequisites - API gateway platform selected and deployed (Kong, AWS API Gateway, Azure APIM, or Apigee) - OpenAPI/Swagger specifications for all backend APIs - TLS certificates for the gateway domain - Identity provider (IdP) configured for OAuth2/OIDC (Okta, Auth0, Azure AD) - Monitoring and logging infrastructure (CloudWatch, Datadog, ELK) - Backend service endpoints registered and reachable from the gateway ## Workflow ### Step 1: Kong Gateway Security Configuration ```yaml # kong.yml - Declarative Kong configuration with security plugins _format_version: "3.0" services: - name: user-service url: http://user-service:8080 routes: - name: user-api paths: - /api/v1/users methods: - GET - POST - PUT - PATCH - DELETE strip...