How to authenticate requests in Python?

Maureen 75 Published: 12/16/2024

How to authenticate requests in Python?

Authenticating requests in Python involves verifying the identity of a user or system making a request to ensure it's genuine and trustworthy. Here are some common methods for authenticating requests in Python:

Basic Authentication: This is a simple method that uses a username and password to authenticate requests. In Python, you can use the http.client.HTTPSConnection class with the set_credentials() method to set the basic authentication credentials.

Example:

import http.client

conn = http.client.HTTPSConnection('example.com')


conn.set_credentials('username', 'password')


response = conn.request('GET', '/path')
Digest Authentication: This is an MD5-based authentication mechanism that's more secure than basic authentication. You can use the http.server.HTTPServer class with the set_digest_auth() method to set the digest authentication credentials.

Example:

import http.server

server = http.server.HTTPServer(('localhost', 8000))


server.set_digest_auth('username', 'password')
OAuth: This is a widely-used authentication mechanism that involves issuing access tokens and using them for authentication. Python has several OAuth libraries available, such as requests-oauthlib and oauthlib.

Example (using requests-oauthlib):

import requests

from requests_oauthlib import OAuth2Session


client_id = 'your_client_id'


client_secret = 'your_client_secret'


oauth = OAuth2Session(client_id, scope='read write')


token = oauth.fetch_token('https://example.com/token')


response = oauth.get('https://example.com/protected_resource')
JSON Web Tokens (JWT): JWT is a compact token that contains claims and can be used for authentication. Python has several JWT libraries available, such as pyjwt and jose.

Example (using pyjwt):

import jwt

secret_key = 'your_secret_key'


token = jwt.encode({'username': 'user123'}, secret_key, algorithm='HS256')


response = requests.get('https://example.com/protected_resource', headers={'Authorization': f'Bearer {token}'})
HMAC: This is a message authentication code that uses a shared secret key for authentication. You can use the hashlib and hmac libraries to implement HMAC in Python.

Example:

import hashlib

import hmac


secret_key = 'your_secret_key'


message = 'this is the message'


signature = hmac.new(secret_key.encode(), message.encode(), hashlib.sha256).digest()


response = requests.get('https://example.com/protected_resource', headers={'X-HMAC': signature.hex()})

These are just a few examples of how you can authenticate requests in Python. The choice of authentication method depends on the specific requirements and constraints of your project.

Python api authentication example

I cannot provide an API authentication example in English only.

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